Thread by @THR

Rachel Zegler, Ariana DeBose and Rita Moreno are not only the faces of the new #WestSideStory – the awards contenders also represent a spectrum of perspectives about Latino identity and representation in Hollywood thr.cm/hO36Vhm

@ArianaDeBose @TheRitaMoreno @rachelzegler When Rita Moreno first came on set, Rachel Zegler and her mother approached her to introduce themselves, but the Latin icon was already familiar with the newcomer’s work. “Oh, your voice is so lovely, I s--t a brick!” she told Zegler thr.cm/hO36Vhm

@ArianaDeBose @TheRitaMoreno @rachelzegler For Rachel Zegler, the 1961 adaptation of #WestSideStory was more about Rita Moreno, who played Anita, than it was about Natalie Wood, who played Maria: “As much as I idolized the Natalie Woods of the world, I wanted to be Rita” thr.cm/hO36Vhm

@ArianaDeBose @TheRitaMoreno @rachelzegler “The most famous incarnations of this character just do not look like me, and they’re beloved portrayals,” Ariana DeBose says of Anita. “I was like, ‘I don’t know if there’s space for [my] interpretation, because I would have to play her as a Black woman’” thr.cm/hO36Vhm

@ArianaDeBose @TheRitaMoreno @rachelzegler Rachel Zegler on the accusations against Ansel Elgort: “A lot has changed [since we made the movie] ... You just hope that the people involved are OK, that they are asked in a respectful manner and that they are given opportunity to answer for themselves” thr.cm/hO36Vhm

@ArianaDeBose @TheRitaMoreno @rachelzegler “[#WestSideStory] really divides along gender lines,” screenwriter Tony Kushner of his version. “The male side is the white side, and it’s the Jets. But on the Puerto Rican side, the story is carried not by the men, but the women” thr.cm/hO36Vhm