Women Rule

The star and showrunner of Netflix’s "One Day At a Time" — one of Hollywood's few series starring and led by women of color — talk Hollywood, sexism and the stereotypes they’re tired of hearing about Latinas. It’s a TV show about a Cuban-American single mother who works as a nurse. She’s an Army veteran and her ex-husband is still a contractor overseas. She has post-traumatic stress, depression and anxiety. Her teenage daughter is an out and proud lesbian in a world that isn’t always welcoming. Her son has been bullied by racists who tell him to “go back to Mexico,” even though he’s a third-generation American. Her mother, a devout Catholic and Cuban immigrant, and lives with them in a small apartment in a working-class Los Angeles neighborhood. If you’re among those who read that and think the show isn’t for you, Machado is having none of it. “We get this question a lot, like, ‘What does it have to do with me? Why should I watch it?’” Machado said in an interview for POLITICO’s Women Rule podcast. “And I’