SOFIA Vergara has revealed her regrets filming America’s Got Talent in the middle of producing her Netflix smash Griselda, as she struggled to get back into character.
The actress and talent show judge played “Cocaine Godmother” Griselda Blanco, which won her rave reviews from critics for her first dabble in drama.
But the 51-year-old has revealed she found it grueling and wishes she had remained focused on the show instead of committing to AGT in the middle of filming.
During a Netflix FYSEE event on Sunday, A Conversation With Sofia Vergara in Los Angeles, she was asked how she coped with juggling the two very different TV projects.
She laughed, “I don’t know what I was thinking. The most absurd thing. But I mean that tells you … if I was a real actress, I would have said absolutely not, I’m not doing this.
“Listen to how crazy this is… I agreed to become Griselda for three months, like three crazy, intense months.
“I think I had four days off to become Sofia, do AGT, which is completely another move to do AGT, that energy. And then finish that for a month and immediately, two days later, start again [filming] Griselda.”
“When I went back, I was like so unprofessional,” she continued.
“I went back to Griselda [and] the director [during] the first scene, I remember we were shooting outside an airport, and then [he] comes after the first two scenes like, ‘Sofia, I think, uh, during lunch I’m going to go into your trailer with my iPad and I’m going to show you the rhythm and the tone of voice that you were doing for Griselda because you’re sounding like AGT.’
“I’m like okay, okay. It took me some time. I shouldn’t have done that. I should have not stopped shooting Griselda to do AGT.”
But Sofia managed to nail the role and was pleased with the reaction from viewers after the show’s release, explaining it had been a passion project for more than 15 years.
The Modern Family star had looked at taking on the role while the real-life Griselda, who created one of the most profitable cartels in history, was still alive.
Inside Sofía Vergara’s Incredible Transformation for Netflix new hit show Griselda
“I started working, finding out more information about her, hiring writers, investigating, but she was still alive,” she said.
“She was released from jail and she was living in Medellin [Colombia]. And I’m like, I can’t do that project right now with this woman that was a monster, destroyed lives, her family’s life, her kid’s life, and I’m gonna make a movie and now she’s out of jail.”
“So I had to wait for her to die,” as the audience laughed at her honest comment,” Sofia admitted.
“But then, you know, she was killed in a very horrific way, the same way, unfortunately, that she used to kill people.
She was released from jail and she was living in Medellin [Colombia]. And I’m like, I can’t do that project right now.
Sofia Vergara
“And so I took the project again, but I didn’t really know what to do with it. And then I started seeing on TV Narcos [the Netflix series]. And I was like, oh my god, these are the people that I need to meet. Because they know everything about the world, and I think they’ll know what to do with her.”
Sofia also served as an executive producer on the show and was transformed into the titular character Griselda with the help of prosthetics, which she said took hours every day.
‘NERVE-WRACKING EXPERIENCE’
She had to wear plastic all over her face from her forehead to her eyebrows and also wore a wig, which she hated but felt was necessary to separate her from her usual work.
“I had no clue what I was doing,” she admitted. “I think if I had really realized what I was gonna go through I would have never had the balls to do it.
“The first week I thought I was dying. First of all, three hours of hair and makeup, I had never worn prosthetics.
“I had never even smoked and then suddenly the director is like, ‘You’re going to be smoking in almost every scene’. I’m like, what do you mean?”
The star then had the crowd laughing, saying, “I never snorted cocaine. I’ve never done crack. So it was kind of like nerve-wracking.
“I’ve never done drama. I was like, what if I have to cry in these scenes, and I’m like, it’s not gonna come out.
“It hit me when I was ready to start filming that week.
“The only good thing that was new was that I had never really acted in Spanish, believe it or not.
“So that was like such a relief. I didn’t have to start to think or translate all the time.”
“It was just feelings, when you’re when you’re acting in your own language. That was really great for me,” she added.
“I would go to Latin America and do more things, but American dollars are better,” Sofia then quipped.
