This week we are joined by director Sebastián Rea and actor Diego Mejia from the short film Heritage which had its east coast premiere at the NY Latino Film Festival. The short centers is based on Sebastián’s own life and is a coming-of-age story that “follows Rumiñahui, “Rumi”, as he navigates his future with the guidance of his Indigenous Andean ancestors, ultimately finding the strength to succeed in a world seemingly working against him.”
The two talk about their experience seeing the most recent version on the big screen at NYLFF in September, the plans for the short in the future to either be expanded into a feature film or possibly a series, and share advice for actors and emerging filmmakers who may leave school feeling unprepared, as well as what they wish they knew earlier on in their careers.
“Schools don’t teach you the business side of filmmaking or the corporate side. There’s no section that taught me about distribution, acquisitions or development,’ Sebastián shared. “School taught me how to produce a short film with some people, but even that working on your indie short film in school is different then doing it on a real set. Even if it’s a PA on set, that will teach you everything you need to know, even if you didnt study school you can learn a lot more just by doing.”
Diego then added, “When I first got here, I was really hungry and thought ‘I wanna work, I wanna do this’ so I did background work and I think I learned a lot more there than in my classes at the beginning because I learned more about what they don’t teach you in these classes. They’ll teach you how to perfect and make your own method of working, but not what the work is really like. I picked up on the language of how they talk on set, where everything is, and what your role is when you come in.”
Watch our full conversation above!
