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Christina Ochoa is ready for the world to meet Veronica Sandoval in ABC’s upcoming Latinx family drama ‘Promised Land’. Born in Barcelona, Spain, the actress spent her childhood between Madrid, Barcelona and Miami surrounded by science and art as the daughter of Spanish sculptor Victor Ochoa, and grand-niece of 1959 Nobel Prize winner Severo Ochoa.
Christina is best known for her roles on ‘Animal Kingdom’, ‘Blood Drive’, and ‘Valor’, and if not on set, she’s in the ocean diving or tagging sharks and whales. The educated artist studied Oceanographic Engineering at Las Palmas University and Advanced Marine Biology at James Cook University. But once she found acting, she fell in love and moved to Los Angeles to pursue her dreams on land.
HOLA! USA had the opportunity to talk to Christina about the upcoming Latinx drama ‘Promised Land’, the moment she decided to make the “not rational” decision to pursue acting, and more.
“I try my best to stay connected to the ocean just because that is, you know, it’s still everything to me, but professionally acting was a love story.”
ABC’s Latinx upcoming drama ‘Promise Land’
You are starring in ABC‘s Promised Land. Tell me a little bit about the show and describe your character, Veronica Sandoval.
So the show is a family saga of the Sandovals and we are led by our patriarch who is played by John Ortiz. And Joe Sandoval runs a winery. His backstory is also explored and the immigrant storyline coming to America, but this is now tackling the second generation Sandovals. I compare it to Succession, you know if there was a Latin version of Succession. So he is in charge and then it’s all about who is going to take over the winery. Veronica, my character is the CEO of the company. She is a businesswoman, a professional.
She will try to do what’s best throughout the first season and then we will kind of have to go along with her for the ride on everything that’s thrown at her, not just from her father’s standpoint, but from her siblings and her environment and her family life and everything. So, I really connected with her because she‘s a professional woman and she’s not one of the tropes and cliches that we‘re used to seeing for Latin women. She’s Stanford educated MBA like she is one of those people who has her s**t together. She’s not a drug dealer, a drug dealer’s girlfriend, you know, we‘re just trying to break some of those stereotypes.
‘Promised Land’ is an epic, generation spanning drama about a Latinx family vying for wealth and power in California’s Sonoma Valley.
Yeah. You must have related to her a lot then considering you have this huge science background. I think it’s amazing. So tell me a little bit about how your story segued into acting.
I have to say, I fell in love with acting, so it’s not rational. It’s clearly not a logical choice. There‘s not a lot of stability and, you know guaranteed like track record versus as if I were going into academia with my kind of background, but I fell in love with it. It’s playful. It encourages me to just jump in and play and fail and all the things that I feel like I really wanted to explore and science is still gonna be my first love and the love of my life if that makes sense. So I still work as much as possible on hiatus. I go shark tagging. I will go on expeditions. I have a company that takes people who are maybe not from the scientific background into these environments and I try my best to stay connected to the ocean just because that is, you know, it‘s still everything to me, but professionally acting was a love story.
Christina most recently starred in ABC‘s dramedy series ‘A Million Little Things’ and is known for her recurring roles in U.S. television shows such as Robert Rodriguez’s “Matador” and TNT’s ‘Animal Kingdom.’
Do you remember the day where you were like, okay, I‘m gonna start telling everyone that I’m ready to go to LA?
I do actually I was in a theater production. I was doing conferences and speaking in public for science and women in science. And I was like, ‘I‘m really shy. I’m really introverted. I‘m not good at this. I’m gonna take a theater class.’ And I took this theater class in Alexandria and we did a production of 12 Angry Women, a spin on 12 Angry Men. And I played, I wanna say it was juror number eight. This is a while ago. And I got to really be explosive and aggravated and aggressive and angry and upset and explore all those feelings. And the first time I did, because it was like, oh, it‘s allowed, I get to experience this. It felt so wonderful. I just, I dove right in. And I was like, okay, well I’m going Hollywood.
So in one of your interviews, you were encouraging people to find an acting coach or mentor that can give you the advice you need along the way. So what has been the best advice that you‘ve received in this journey?
Finding your tribe is the word I can use. I know it‘s a little bit overused lately, but finding your tribe, finding people that you understand when they communicate, or kind of the message they’re giving. Cause I think there’s an acting coach for everyone. There’s an agent for everyone, there are different styles. Think of it as dating, is the best advice I could possibly get. I‘m in this because it makes me happy because I like the pursuit of it. And I like the experience of engaging these people. And if for whatever reason I didn’t, then I’m not hung up on a metric or on success or on a result. For me it’s process-driven, not result-oriented, and finding the person that communicates- with me I lucked out.
I found Sara Mornell after trying every acting coach in LA and she was such a, for me, a pioneer in advocating for women on getting actors from being the lowest common denominator or like at the bottom of that totem pole, and empowering them and giving them that, you know, sense of authority over their work and their craft that I just lucked out. So my advice is always to find that person that can help empower you.
I love that. So what has been your most challenging role today? I love that you‘re always doing roles that are like you said before, making a statement. So what would you say has been the most challenging in terms of, you know the research, and the character.
Veronica is definitely up there. Every character I tackle is a woman that’s very good at something. I like high-level competence. I’m very attracted to it, both on a personal level and on a character. And so, whether it’s a drug dealer on ‘Animal Kingdom’, she’s very good at what she does, or if she’s being manipulative or she’s evil.
In Veronica‘s case, she is a businesswoman. She is a family-oriented businesswoman, which is like a very difficult world to meld and she’s very good at it. That‘s hard, but also the fact that what she’s good at is so foreign to me because I don‘t drink, even though I’m from Spain, I don’t drink, I don’t drink wine. So for me, I was just like, oh my gosh, I can‘t tell them I don’t drink . Cause I think the show runners‘ first comment when we spoke was kind of like, ‘wine on set!’ Which was a joke obviously, but ‘wine! and it’ll be so much fun.’ And all I kept thinking about was that episode of, ‘I Love Lucy’ where she‘s stomping on the grapes with no clue what she’s doing. So I’m like oh man I really have to dive in. But the research is so rewarding, I’m a big nerd at heart so I gravitate towards it.
That’s hilarious. So back to your education, do you think that having that education has helped you as an actress in terms of getting into these roles? I always think that everyone should have to take GEs and have to learn about, you know, race and class and all that stuff.
I don’t necessarily know if there’s a direct correlation or at least causation for a better career, as an actress with my education. But I truly believe a fuller life leads to fuller performances, whatever that is. Whether that‘s experiences or that’s travel or that’s family, or it’s a career or a history and background that is kind of diametrically opposed, doesn’t matter what it is. I do believe that it will inform your choices and kind of maybe fill them in and give your performance a little more gravitas than perhaps is already on the page or has been, you know, put there forth for you.
I love the ocean. I think it’s so cool that you dive, I’m sure every single time you go out is amazing but is there one experience that has been your favorite ?
I try to go for hammerhead and tiger [shark] season to Bimini and The Bahamas with our company it’s called Rogue Expeditions. And we try to go with a group of people. Most of them, either like me used to doing fieldwork with wildlife or people who have never done it before. And I will say, recently I got to take my husband for the first time ever shark tagging. And, you know, on one of these experiences and watching that first time experience is always meaningful, but this one, in particular, was just that much more uplifting and exciting to me because I got to live through him what it feels like to get in the water with these mega apex predators that people are terrified of and kind of just embrace it and fall in love with them instead. So I got to see that.
Yeah, that sounds like a dream. So I feel like I kind of have gotten to know you talking, you’re just like a shining light, but how would you describe who Christina Ochoa is?
Oh gosh. You know what I would love to never have to describe who Christina Ochoa is because I love the idea of being vague and living in my subtleties or in my grays or not being able. I think that representation- somebody, I can‘t remember who it was- but somebody recently told me existence is resistance and having women like you and like Veronica and this representation having them exist without explaining or justifying them itself is a statement.
I love that! So aside from Promised Land, what else can we look forward to in 2022?
Wow. I’m very, very lucky. I have two movies coming out and season six, which is our final ever from ‘John Wells’ Animal Kingdom’ on TNT. And the experience, you know, six years on anything, with a family like that is something I‘m super grateful for. So that, and then two movies that were independent features filmed during the pandemic. So against all odds managed to pull through and finish and we all rallied together. So I’m excited about those too, and they‘re all kinda coming at the same time, so help me (laughs). No, I’m, I’m very, very grateful. So hopefully those come, I don’t have an exact date. I know ‘Animal Kingdom’ comes early in the year and the other two, I believe in the year.