Currently co-starring in the movie “Flamin’ Hot,” actress Annie Gonzalez was honored at the 2023 Maui Film Festival on Saturday with the Rising Star Award, which recognizes an actor or actress “for abundant creativity to support honest and life-changing art.”

Visiting Maui for the first time, Gonzalez said she was grateful for “a beautiful evening to come together and commune over cinema.

“As filmmakers, we tell stories because we need to, because we’re healers. This (‘Flamin’ Hot’) project has healed me and has given me the opportunity and the platform to stand in front of you as a brown woman, as a Chicana, as an only child from a single-parent household from East L.A.,” Gonzalez said. “My whole life I’ve been told that I couldn’t or that I shouldn’t, but my North Star has always remained rooted in God consciousness, radical childlike joy, and the remembrance that by you letting your light shine you’ll consciously allow others to do the same.”

In “Flamin’ Hot,” Gonzalez plays Judy Montañez, the supportive wife of Richard Montañez, who claimed to have invented the popular snack Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. An inspiring, feel-good movie about cultural pride and self-empowerment, it tells the story of a Mexican-American high school dropout who rose from a factory janitor to Frito-Lay corporate vice president. Along the way, it deals with racism and discrimination and the struggle of marginalized people to rise above overt and subtle oppression.

The Hollywood Reporter proclaimed it an “utterly delightful rags-to-riches story that should appeal to anyone in need of uplifting.”

The film generated some controversy when a Los Angeles Times investigation raised questions over Montañez’s claims that he invented the snack, but director Eva Longoria told Entertainment Weekly that the article “had zero effect on the movie we were telling.”

“We weren’t making a movie about the history of the Flamin’ Hot Cheeto,” Longoria said. “We’re telling the story of Richard Montañez.”

Interviewed after receiving her award, Gonzalez explained that making the film was healing “because I finally was able to use my gifts to their ability, and I was able to channel some of my favorite people. My tias (aunties), my mom, all the women that had a hand in taking care of me. That’s who I was on that screen up there.”

The film is important, she said, because “it gives the Latino community especially an opportunity to see themselves not just as the object, but the subject of something, and not just a trauma story.

“We can rise from our ashes,” Gonzalez said.

“I feel like a lot of the time with films that have faces that look like mine, we’re constantly explaining ourselves and why we deserve to be here. And here, you see the oppression, you see the racism, you see the adversity, but that’s not what the story is about. The story is about if you believe in yourself and you believe in something bigger than you, you’ll be able to achieve that goal. Believe in yourself, and that you need other people to believe in you, too. It’s okay to ask for help.”

Before “Flamin’ Hot,” Gonzalez was featured in a number of projects including the drama “East of the Mountains” and the TV series “Vida.” She is perhaps most known for her role as Lidia Solis in the Netflix Latino TV series “Gentefied.”

Busy with a number of future projects, Gonzalez will star in and executive produce a new biopic based on the life of Mexican-American pop star Jenni Rivera, one of the most successful female singers in the male-dominated grupero musical style, who died in a plane crash in 2012.

Gonzalez said she was initially terrified of taking on the role. 

“It can be terrifying to step into your power, your greatness,” she said. “I had gotten the audition, and I said no twice. I didn’t know then that I was scared. It just was, I don’t want to do this, because it’s such a big undertaking. The statistics show that very few Latino faces occupy the screen, and then even more so when it’s a woman and it’s a Latina.

“It’s a big responsibility, especially someone like that, an icon. Jenni Rivera means so much to a culture, to a community, to women. And then, looking more in at her life, there are so many parallels between what she went through and what I’ve been through. I think that’s the cosmic thing that I feel roles choose me. I’m a firm believer in prayer and manifestation.”

At the time of her death, Rivera was the single most successful woman on the Billboard Latin charts. It was later revealed that she suffered an abusive relationship, had attempted suicide and been raped, she recounted in her autobiography. An icon to many Latina women, she championed the rights of single mothers and those who experienced sexual violence.

“The more I got to learn about her and her music, I knew I was meant to embody her,” Gonzalez continued. “She was a women’s rights activist before it was a thing. Like before it was cool, especially in the Latino community. A lot of the time, we are the object, not the subject. When things like that occur with domestic violence and sexual abuse, especially in our communities, it is very victim-blaming. It’s like, what were you doing? What were you wearing? And she was like, no, I’m not taking this lying down. I’m not a victim because of it. She was like, everything that I’ve been through, I am not going to be ‘poor me.’ It happened for a reason, and it probably happened so I could have this platform to help other women that look like me. She’s empowered me.”

Besides the Rivera feature film, Gonzalez will also be seen in a number of future dramas including the thrillers “The Bad Shepherd,” “Body Language” and “Drive-Away Dolls,” by Oscar-winning director Ethan Coen.

As an actress, Gonzalez feels her work serves a higher purpose. 

“I think my work as a creative is to channel God,” she affirmed. “I can’t do it without help. If I’m recreating the human experience, I can’t do that by myself.”

Actress Yara Shahidi was also honored on Saturday, receiving the Shining Star Award, but due to illness she was unable to attend.