Puerto Rico’s native son, René Pérez Joglar, better known as Residente to his legions of fans, has dominated the music industry for decades — and now he’s looking to disrupt Hollywood.

Residente, a four-time Grammy and 29-time Latin Grammy Award winner, is gearing up to make his feature film directorial debut with Porto Rico, an epic Caribbean Western and historical drama led by Benito “Bad Bunny” Martínez Ocasio in his first role as a leading man. Rounding out the principal cast are Hollywood heavyweights Viggo Mortensen, Edward Norton and Javier Bardem. The project also heralds Residente’s debut as a screenwriter, sharing the credit with Oscar-winning writer and fellow Boricua, Alexander Dinelaris (Birdman).

Tackling a major project like this would cause anyone to second-guess themselves, but not Residente. He’s had mentors and friends, both new and old, who helped him along the way, like Alejandro G. Iñárritu, who serves as executive producer of Porto Rico. It was through Iñárritu that Residente met Dinelaris, and a scriptwriting collaboration was born.

“Toward the end of the pandemic, Alex and I got together. I had assumed he would be writing on his own, but he would call me to sit with him while he worked. Perhaps it was a way for him to hold himself accountable and force himself to write; or perhaps it was to ask me technical questions, historical details, and so forth. In the end, I wound up writing the entire film right alongside him,” Residente recalls.

“I was able to apply the storytelling techniques I used in my music, but now within the context of cinema — a different medium requiring a different structure. And from there, the screenplay emerged. Alex taught me a tremendous amount. He is a brilliant writer, but he is also a brilliant mentor — he really knows how to teach you the craft. He has a gift.”

It wasn’t that I didn’t see Benito as an actor; initially, I just envisioned him in a different role. But then I started seeing him as the lead more and more.

Residente

Earlier in the pandemic, he received a visit from his friend Benito — Bad Bunny to most everyone else in the world, and a fellow disruptor who recently ignited online discourse with his Super Bowl performance, a tribute to their native Puerto Rico. During his stay, his buddy became interested in the script Residente was writing. He let it be known early on that he’d like to be involved in the project.

“Benito was part of it right from the moment I started writing the story. He used to come visit me at my house during the pandemic — in fact, he stayed over several times — and he’d see me working on the story. He’d see the books I was reading and say, ‘Oh, is that what you’re working on?’ I told him all about it, and he always said to me, ‘Hey, if you’ll let me, I’d love to be in it, even if it’s just a small role.” It was a sweet gesture, and it did start out that way, with a small supporting role for him. But eventually, it evolved into something much bigger.”

The reason Residente didn’t have Bad Bunny in mind for the lead role was because he had hoped to discover an unknown Puerto Rican actor to have as the film’s centerpiece, whom he would surround “with a cast of strong, seasoned performers.” But the more he thought about things the more his thinking “started to shift”.

“I said, ‘At a certain point, your name just popped into my head, and I couldn’t get it out,’” Residente recalls of his conversation with Bad Bunny following the Puerto Rico visit. “It wasn’t that I didn’t see Benito as an actor; initially, I just envisioned him in a different role. But then I started seeing him as the lead more and more. I said to him, ‘Brother, my gut is telling me something here. Why shouldn’t I share the opportunity with someone I’ve known for years, someone who represents Puerto Rico?’ It just makes total sense for him to be this character. It feels perfect.”

So, Residente reached out to Bad Bunny, and sent him the script in the hopes of confirming that his gut feeling was right.

“I wanted to see what kind of energy he would bring to me after reading the script, how he’d respond,” Residente remembers.

“And his response was even better than I could have imagined. He absolutely loved the script. He cried reading it; he felt it so deeply. So, I said to him, ‘Alright, brother, we’re in. We’re going to jump off this bridge together — we’re making a blood pact. We are taking this risk together.’” Fortunately, his friend agreed to his terms.

Residente understands that people will have certain expectations for the film. And he feels that this is an important project, one that is worth taking a risk for.

While the movie will probably be one of the most important works of Residente’s career, he is fully cognizant of the possibility that this might be a one-time opportunity. So, he is taking it all in with his eyes wide open. His goal is to tell a story about his island, one of his only non-negotiables going into the project.

“For me, that was the most important thing, making a film about Puerto Rico. I knew it would have been much easier to make a movie in English and to direct something that would be much easier to sell. But I wanted to face the challenge of making the movie I want to make — one that is 85% in Spanish — and still manage to sell it. How can I pull that off? So, I assembled an incredible team and a tremendous cast who will help me ensure that the message gets out there. I don’t have a vested interest in the financial outcome. I just want to make the movie, regardless of whether it makes or loses money. But the investors do, and the studio certainly does.”

He adds, “I believe it is a film that will resonate with many things happening around the world, specifically regarding identity: that theme of identity that affects us Latin Americans living abroad so deeply.”

The film is a full-circle moment for the younger version of René, who struggled with undiagnosed ADHD growing up. Through all his accomplishments, he is no longer defined by his neurodivergence. In fact, today he is able to look back at his younger self — the musician who was playing drums, alto-sax and guitar with proficiency at age 7, who dreamed of being a baseball star, who watched his mother perform her heart out as a theater actress and singer, who worked with his father and stepfather, and later with his brother and sister, on Calle 13, their hit Urban Latino group — and see that life’s challenges are very often a gift.

“ADHD gave me a kind of power, almost like a superpower, that I learned how to harness,” he reflects. “Now, I do a ton of things all at once, and people ask me, ‘But how do you manage to do it all?’ You see, ever since I was little, I had to endure the bitter struggle of not being understood; people didn’t understand what they were dealing with. Little by little, though, they started to get it — my mom, especially — and I started to understand myself, too.

“That process continued right up to this very day,” he adds. “In fact, I feel like I only just finished truly understanding myself.”