Comedy Legend John Leguizamo: A Self-Proclaimed Ghetto Intellectual and Freak
Latino USA
My Cultura, Futuro and iHeartPodcasts
4.8 • 3.8K Ratings
🗓️ 12 April 2026
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
John Leguizamo is back on our screens—though he never really left. For decades he has played characters that have become comedy cult classics: Chi Chi Rodriguez in To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar, to Benny Blanco in Carlitos Way, and Tybalt in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet. He’s the voice of Bruno in Encanto and Sid the Sloth in Ice Age. Roles that he argues would have skyrocketed any white actor to stardom. In this episode we break down his roles, why he thinks entertainers have a responsibility to speak up and get a peek into his new Hulu show where he plays Pablo Escobar.
Latino USA is the longest-running news and culture radio program in the U.S., centering Latino stories and hosted by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | No gloss, no filter, just stories. |
| 0:11.4 | Spoken without fear. |
| 0:13.2 | Person who is not generous can not be an artist. |
| 0:16.0 | The world will be at peace only when it is ruled by poets and philosophers. |
| 0:20.9 | Listen to my weekly podcast, the Pooja Abhawad show and the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. |
| 0:29.9 | Come for the honesty. Stay for the fire. |
| 0:36.4 | Dear Latino USA listener, before we start, you should know that if you want to listen to this episode, add free. |
| 0:43.8 | Just join Futuro Plus. |
| 0:45.8 | And you can join for as little as $7 a month. |
| 0:49.4 | Joining also gets you behind the scenes access and yes, some some cheese may. So click the link in the episode |
| 0:57.2 | description, and after you do that, then click play. Let's go to the show. |
| 1:07.0 | Dear listener, you're going to hear a slur in our next piece. |
| 1:14.7 | It is from a title of the show, so we've kept it in for clarity. |
| 1:18.7 | Okay, you've been warned. |
| 1:20.7 | I'm in the studio waiting for Emmy Award-winning actor John Leuizamo. |
| 1:27.2 | Okay, here he comes. |
| 1:30.6 | Okay. |
| 1:32.0 | Look at you. |
| 1:32.5 | You're looking great. |
| 1:33.4 | Look at those arms. |
| 1:34.5 | And I'm pretty excited because the first time I interviewed John Leuizamo was back in the early 1990s. |
| 1:44.9 | And I don't know if you remember when it was. |
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