Camila Mendes is one of the stars of the CW hit show Riverdale, where she stars as Veronica Lodge. the 23-year-old has had a meteoric rise to fame after attending New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and now she is only set to see her star rise as the show prepares to return for a third season.
Mendes, who was born to Brazilian parents, is proud to introduce Latino culture and dialect to the series.
“That choice made so much sense,” Mendes said in an interview with W Magazine. “I’m so happy…and it’s not just Veronica, it’s the whole Lodge family being all Latino…portraying Latinos as a strong, powerful, intelligent family. We do well, we’re go-getters.”
She added, “Being Latina, everyone is always going to want to be like ‘Fierce, sexy, strong, confident!’—which is great, I think that’s definitely a good type of personality to portray and it’s empowering—but Latinas can be the goofy, nerdy, quirky, vulnerable women that I think is usually associated with white girls.”
After bursting onto the scene with Riverdale, where she won a Teen Choice Award for Choice Scene Stealer, she also made the transition to the silver screen where she made her feature film debut in The New Romantic before filming The Stand-In.
To keep up with Camila, be sure to hit follow on Instagram where the actress currently has more than 9.7 million followers. You can also check out more photos of the “Riverdale” star in the gallery below.