Exclusive! John Leguizamo: Naatu Naatu’s a mixture of real history with music and dance and Bollywood, I loved it!

Ever charming, outrageously funny and a voice one wouldn’t easily forget!

Ask Primetime Emmy-winning actor John Leguizamo about the feeling of working on a project dominated by women, and he gushes, before mouthing the words we hoped he would say—”It’s fantastic!”

The Golden Globe nominee, in an exclusive interview with OTTplay, talked about the nitty-gritty of his character Rob from the series The Power (Amazon Prime Video), explains why he wants a woman to lead America to glory and his honest-to-God thoughts on Indian film RRR’s Naatu Naatu winning the Best Original Song at the recently held Oscars.

Edited excerpts from our chat with the global actor:

John, you are very crucial your character is very crucial to the plot. There are times when your character sort of takes a backseat for the women to rise and shine. Right? How was it being part of a series where women literally had all ‘the power’?

JL: You know, it's not the first time (as it is) like my third movie where women had all the power, and it was great. I loved it. And, especially in this this show, where the writer and the creator are women, the producers are women that all the directors are women. The stars are women. It's fantastic! I mean, I felt very included. I felt very respected. I felt very much a team. Yeah, really. But it is exciting to work with them. Filling most of the positions, it's integrated.

And I love Rob (his character in The Power) that if he's comfortable with it. He's comfortable with his wife being the breadwinner, being the ambitious one being the one that that's going to be the biggest star in the family dominates. I love that he's comfortable with it. It's amazing, and how he will take care of the kids. It's how men ought to be and how we're taking on that role more and more.

Quick follow-up question: Do you think that women are finally being heard, and are getting their due in politics?

JL: Yeah, I hope to see I mean, a woman president United States, and I mean, you know, that's going to happen. I mean, it almost happened with Hillary and Kamala Harris almost became president, I think we're at a time where women are going to be in charge, and we're all going to be okay with it and realize, why wasn't this done sooner?

Your thoughts on people of colour being recognized, especially the Asian community, at the recently concluded scars 2023?

JL: Absolutely! Yeah, it was great to see Michel Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan getting their recognition and Asian-Americans finally getting a chance to be seen and heard. It was a very beautiful, powerful moment.

My last question to you is about India’s dual win at the Oscars. Did you manage to catch the live performance of Naatu Naatu and what did you think of it?

JL: Naatu Naatu was incredible; it was the mixture of real history with music and dance and Bollywood it was it was it was incredible. I loved it!