The Walter Mercado Doc We’ve Been Dreaming of Is Coming to Netflix
When Walter Mercado died on November 2nd, I wasn’t prepared
Photo: Unsplash/@freestocks
When Walter Mercado died on November 2nd, I wasn’t prepared. I didn’t realize how essential his daily astrology readings meant to my life. Worse than that, I didn’t take into account how much he meant to our community. In the days and months following his death, the outpouring of love over Mercado and his legacy was profound and rightly deserved. That love and praise continue today and will be coming to Netflix very soon!
A documentary about Mercado titled “Mucho Mucho Amor” just screened at the Sundance Film Festival, and now Netflix has announced it will be showing it this summer. The film is directed by Cristina Costantini, Kareem Tabsch, and produced by Alex Fumero.
“I like to say he’s something like an Oprah, Mr. Rogers, and a little bit of Liberace mixed in,” Costantini said in an interview with CNN. “Walter is incredibly media-trained. Having spent so much time with him, we were able to meet the man behind the cape and show who he actually is.”
I am thrilled that this film isn’t being told by white filmmakers who want to capitalize on his name after seeing Mercado’s impact after his death. That is just one of the reasons why we’re so excited to see this documentary, and I am not alone. The filmmakers were able to be with him before his death. They are making this film with his blessing, and they are Latinx filmmakers. People from our community are telling his story, and I, for one, am so amped about that.
“The three of us feel like his message is more relevant than ever,” Costantini told CNN. “In a time of great division, when there’s hatred and discrimination everywhere, we need Walter.”
While I have yet to see a trailer for this movie, I can only imagine how they will show Mercado’s life from infancy to the grandmaster of hopes, dreams, and love.
“Mucho Mucho Amor” includes interviews with Lin-Manuel Miranda and Eugenio Derbez and Raul De Molina, among others. The film is expected to be released on Netflix by this summer.
