When Gloria Calderón Kellett’s “With Love” series dropped on Amazon Prime in December 2021, it hit differently from any other rom-com series or film featuring a mostly Latine cast. In this cross-generational romance, we got to experience couples falling in love — including the show’s lead Lily Diaz (played by Emeraude Toubia) — in a beautiful and lighthearted way, without the trauma.
For many Latinas, Lily’s character is quite relatable. She’s a hopeless romantic who’s in love with love. Her parents are happily married, so she’s been conditioned to believe that if you find love, get married, and have kids, your life will be perfect. But in season two, Lily starts to realize that her idea of happily ever after in love doesn’t actually exist.
For Toubia, this is an unrealistic standard that she once set herself.
“I think it’s become more known that we grew up with these expectations that don’t exist, right? . . . We’re taught to go to school, get good grades, go to college, be successful, but don’t be too successful where you push men away,” Toubia tells POPSUGAR. “Especially being from a Latino family, you have to bow down to your significant other in a way. [There’s] societal expectations, then you get married, then you have kids, and that’s your life.”
“Growing up, we’re like, ‘OK, this is what I have to do, and if I do this step by step, my life is going to be great.’ And that’s not how it works. It’s crazy, because my personal life kind of bled into what was happening on the show.”
But just like her character, Toubia’s perspective has since shifted: “Growing up, we’re like, ‘OK, this is what I have to do, and if I do this step by step, my life is going to be great.’ And that’s not how it works. It’s crazy, because my personal life kind of bled into what was happening on the show.”
Toubia is referring to her relationship with her ex-husband Prince Royce. After 12 years together and three years of marriage, the Mexican Lebanese actress and Dominican…
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