It’s no secret if you know me that Yellowjackets is one of my all-time favorite pieces of media, so it was truly such a delight to have the opportunity to sit down for a conversation with one of the stars of the first two seasons, Luciano Leroux, who portrays the innocent Javi Martinez.
Spoiler alert for those that haven’t seen the first two seasons: when his character fell into a frozen lake and wasn’t able to be saved in time, it was a heartbreaking moment for fans as we all kind of loved his character. He was one of the only ones that truly felt innocent and because he was so young and had his whole life ahead of him, it was even more tragic.
When asked about why we all love Javi, Luciano had this to say.
“To be completely honest, I was very surprised and overwhelmed by the fact that a lot of people did like the character just because when I finished the first season, I was like ‘This character is the annoying kid that drags everybody back’. That’s what I was thinking. They’d be better off without him, he’s dead weight. But, I think a lot of people found him to be just an innocent boy that was just unfortunately trapped in that situation that he had no businesss being in.”
Watching his performance in the show, you’d think that he would have had tons of acting experience but Yellowjackets is one of just a few credits he has under his belt so far. When I asked about his acting background and what made him want to get into acting, he said it was never in his plans to start with.
“Funny story, I didn’t want to do acting at all when I was younger. I wanted to play sports. I wanted to be a soccer player or football player or whatever you want to call it. I had no intention of ever becoming an actor but I think… yeah… I got casted for this documentary and I just liked being in front of the cameras as a kid. I asked my mom what it was all called and she said ‘it’s called acting.’ And I was like ‘Oh, cool, I want to do that.’ My parents… I’m super grateful for them, they’ve always been very supportive. They helped me get into acting.”
Whenever I sit down with an actor, I love to ask them what their favorite movies or shows are as it helps me to get a better understanding as to what perhaps inspires them creatively.
“I do have an all-time favorite. And a lot of people don’t really like it… I mean, okay, my all-time favorite is Jurassic World. As a kid I loved dinosaurs so I watched it and kind of fell in love with it. But, I don’t know, gun to my head, if you asked me if I’d rather watch Jurassic World or, like, Titanic or something, I’d watch Jurassic World.”
Thanks to Luciano for the conversation!
