Gina Rodriguez worked out so much for ‘Miss Bala’ that her co-star didn’t recognise her.
The 34-year-old actress plays a young woman who fights against a drug cartel to save her kidnapped friend in Mexico and had to put hours in at the gym, but she worked out so much that her co-star Anthony Mackie failed to recognise her.
She said: "Joe took me down his path of training and he’s a hardcore athlete. So that was definitely a world I had never entered into. It was a strict diet. It was working out seven days a week. Way too many hours a day. It’s a lifestyle I don’t think I wanna do. No, I’m kidding. Hopefully for a character but that’s what you go through, and the cool thing is having the opportunity to go through it, because, to be honest, if I wasn’t Miss Bala, I probably wouldn’t have put my body through that because it’s so strict."
Whilst Anthony added to Entertainment Tonight: "Her hair pulled back, sweaty, [breathing hard]. I’m on the treadmill, like, jeez Louise these girls are going at it … So she comes over and she goes, ‘Hey Anthony, how’s it going?’ I’m like, ‘Hey’. She goes, ‘It’s Gina.’ I’m like, ‘Gee, you a rough. You are working. You are going for this character hard. Way to go champ! Like, whew, you’re burning a thousand calories today.’"
Meanwhile, Gina previously insisted fairer representation in the film and television industry would create a "much more tolerant" society.
She said: "Growing up as a Latina in the United States, I didn’t see us portrayed positively on TV. When you see certain images repeated so often, the reflection of representation on screen makes you feel a certain way about yourself … I just wonder how much more tolerant our society would be if there weren’t such stereotypical roles portrayed for so long. If Latinos weren’t always portrayed as the villain, would we really feel a particular way about that community? If Muslims weren’t portrayed as the terrorists, would we feel a certain way about that community? I don’t think so."
Gina Rodriguez unrecognisable after Miss Bala workouts
