Sometimes you interview an actor that makes interviews so easy. This was one of those times. Jan Luis Castellanos, the actor playing Croy in the Netflix adaptation of Uglies, is one of those actors.
From the moment I logged into Zoom, the actor had a smile on his face, ready to answer everything that I was about to throw at him. You could tell that acting is his passion. It’s his art.
It’s everything that he wants to be doing.
He’s dressed in a white long-sleeve shirt, sitting in front of bookshelves. My background was quickly blurred, as I realized that the most inappropriate sign was behind me. I’m nervous – my internet giving me trouble and I am hoping that it doesn’t go out and the recording of the interview gets messed up.
Luckily the PR people record it for me.
I dive right in, staring at him and hoping that I can maintain my composure and dial back my bluntness. I’d watched the movie and though I enjoyed it – it may not be for the reasons that I should have.
I loved the books, which were written by Scott Westerfeld two decades ago. I knew that they were optioned a long time ago and then never made and I thought that they would never get made. It just felt like another time.
Yet, here we are and the movie is made. It’s actually been out for almost a week at the time of publication. Yes, I am scheduling this after release because well, to remind you to watch.
NOW IS THE TIME
As we exchange pleasantries, I ask the most basic of questions, “Why is it time for Uglies?”
Not that I am too proud of that question, but it feels like an important question and Jan has a really good answer.
He smiles and says, “I think it’s definitely the time for Uglies, because right now there are so many comparables out there, especially with social media and AI and technology. It’s incredible when I think about this because you just have to give so much credit to Scott Westerfeld. He was so ahead of his time back in what, 2005 or something like that, when this thing was coming out and we didn’t even consider AI to be a possibility. Instagram was not a thing. Nowadays, it’s just all over the place where people just get this anxiety because they think they, ‘I should be like this, I should be like that.'”
I watch his hands. You can tell if a response is media-trained, because most actors, will start moving their thumbs or twiddling their fingers. But he’s not. He’s sincere in his words. He says, “This movie is really important, especially in today’s society, because of that, because it allows you to understand, ‘Hey, look, you have free will here to do whatever you, whatever it is that you want. Just to let you know, you’re already perfect.'”
I recall reading the book for the first time and wondering why I didn’t get the idea that being pretty would solve everything. Most of my “pretty” friends have the same issues as I do.
WHAT IS “PRETTY”
Uglies was one of the first book fandoms I was ever in. Assuming that Jan has read the books, I mentioned that I never understood why being “pretty” would make everything better. I asked him.
He sat there for a second and said, “I don’t know. I guess that’s how society seems to view it in today’s world. They think that if they’ve had the perfect ears, the eyes, the nose, the lips, the hair, all these things, I would be so happy. In the real world, not in the movie, we know that that’s not the case, oftentimes because there’s more to it. Maybe for some people, that’s what makes them happy. You never know, but at the end of the day, what’s the price of all of that, really?”
BUT NO ONE IS UGLY
In the movie, Jan’s character is part of the Smoke. The Smoke are people who chose to not to have the surgery to be “pretty” but, they are more complex than just that. They are looking for a cure – to solve the issues that the surgery causes. But I don’t want to get too deep into that, because well, you need to watch the movie to learn more.
If the people in The Smoke didn’t get the surgery, one thing that bugged me was that literally no one in The Smoke was ugly.
And before I knew it, my filter was gone and I said, “Real talk though, none of the people in the Smoke are ugly. I get that they’re supposed to be ugly because they haven’t had their surgery, but like real talk, none of them are ugly.”
Oops. That wasn’t supposed to be said. Pivot Erin. Pivot.
I managed to ask, “It got me to thinking, what makes a person beautiful?”
He smiled and tried to not laugh at me. I would have laughed at myself, because I was beat red at this point, “I think, honestly, what makes a person beautiful is who they really are on the inside and what you transmit from that core value of yours. That’s so important. That’s what we really tried to stand by in this movie. You see everybody’s worth and what they bring to the table, whether it’s food or joy or laughter, themselves, just being really happy and not being stripped away from their individuality. That is just so critical in this movie.”
LET ME JUST HUMILIATE MYSELF
And then I find myself telling him that he’s not ugly. Legitimately, I tell him, “You’re not ugly.”
He smiles but keeps answering my previous question, allowing me to save some face.
He continues, “The Uglies are beautiful people, Why do we need to become pretty? Why do we need to become pretty? There is no need. You are who you are, you’re perfect. You’re just considered an ugly because of somebody else, some other person’s standards. Who are you to judge? Who are you to tell me who I am? I am me. I am perfect in my eyes and this is who I want to be.”
His character of Croy is – well he’s got a pretty big chip on his shoulder. He’s aggressive and just angry in his tone. I ask him why Croy is this way and why he’s so skeptical of Tally.
THE REASONS FOR THE CHIP
He says, “We know that the majority of the time, that 99.9% of the time, anybody that has made it to the Smoke has come with the help of others and, other Smokies that want to really stay true to themselves. For me, I was just very curious as Croy, very curious as to, hey, how– did this young woman have any help or not? Because if she didn’t, I’d be very, very, very impressed. This girl’s really, really, really strong. If she did have help, I’m just curious as to what’s going on here, because the most important thing for me is protecting– the sacrifice we all made to get here.”
But we both can agree that Croy changes through the movie though, “That’s why I think that chip in the shoulder that you talk about [laughs], it comes down little by little as the film goes away, and he becomes a very forgivable person, I would say, because he understands that, he was wrong, maybe at the end of the day, I don’t know.”
WHY YOU SHOULD WATCH
The thing about Jan is he’s not trying to convince me that he knows everything. He’s really conveying his thoughts. I can tell this by the way that his face moves, his staring at me and making eye contact. He’s an actor, sure. But I genuinely believe that all of this means something to him.
Time is wrapping up and I have gotten the notice for one final question. I say to him, “What would you say to book lovers who are hesitant to see the movie because it is almost 20 years later, and why should they watch it?”
He sits up straight and says to me, “They should watch it because it’s been 20 years, first of all. It’s a long time if you’re a fan girl, a fanboy of this series and you loved it when you were young and it affected your youth, I don’t see why it wouldn’t affect you in today’s world, one hundred percent. I would say that, of course, not all adaptions of every single book are going to be perfect when it comes to the movie, but we worked very closely with Scott Westerfeld and of course with Netflix and the production just to make sure we got as much of all these details as possible, to really transmit that on the screen.”
He smiled and continued, “That was really important to us. I think they did a fantastic job through and through. Of course, you might have your minor differences here and there, but the story, which is the most important part, the message is still being told.”
Well said.
Uglies is streaming now on Netflix.
