Luna Lauren Velez
©2018 Angela María Ortíz S.
I had a wonderful time sitting down with la increible Luna Lauren Velez, who does an incredible job as the voice of Miles Morales’ mom–yes, the other Spider-Man, the Afro-Latino one from one of many alternate Earths–in the new animated feature, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.
Miles Morales and mom, Rio.
Luna Lauren Velez
You know Lana. She was Lieutenant–excuse me, Captain–Maria LaGuerta for years on Dexter; she was a huge part of New York Undercover and Oz, appeared in a long arc on How to Get Away with Murder last year and showed up in The First Purge this year. Now she’s getting more and more involved in live theater and feature films, with roles in four feature films in 2019, including playing a ‘bad guy’ in the next movie in the Shaft series, Son of Shaft (and that’s all she’ll tell us!).
Velez and Angela Ortíz
We spent a wonderful fifteen minutes talking about her career, the joys of Spanglish, the long-awaited emergence of Afro-Latinos in media (and comics!), and the challenge of her first work as a voice actor in an animated film. I say at the very beginning of this interview that I was “jazzed” to have a chance to talk to her…and I still am. Listen to our conversation…
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is in theaters December 14.
