Latinx Files: Why I’m writing about ‘This Fool’ again

“Sometimes out of curiosity and my own vanity, I’ll search for the show on Twitter and see that people are recommending it, or that they’ve just found out about it,” Chris Estrada, the co-creator and co-star of Hulu’s “This Fool,” told me.

It was the end of March and we, along with co-star Frankie Quiñones, were sitting in a gray sparse office in the back of a North Hollywood studio. I had been invited on set and granted a short interview with the two comedians well ahead of the show’s second season.

Because they were still filming episodes, my questions mostly focused on generalities, like what the reception had been like after it premiered in 2022. I figured I could always ask for a follow-up interview after seeing the season two screeners.

“Everybody’s been really nice,” Estrada added.

By the time I finally got around to watching the screeners, the Writers Guild of America had gone on strike against the studios, and any opportunity to speak to Estrada about the show had vanished.

I’ve been thinking about Estrada’s response a lot in the last week, and how it alluded to the organic, word-of-mouth campaign that followed after the show initially premiered last year. Though “This Fool” was instantly a critical darling — it has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes — it hadn’t received much coverage before its release.

I myself learned about it after meeting a friend for lunch one day, who insisted I watch it. It was his recommendation that prompted me to do a Q&A with Estrada a week later in the Latinx Files. And just as my friend had done, I too told the homies that they should stream it because I thought they would like it.

Flash forward to 2023, and the comedy had a lot more press coverage — my colleague Yvonne Villarreal profiled Estrada; so did Esquire; and I wrote about the music of the show for De Los.

Still, because of the labor stoppage — in mid-July, SAG-AFTRA, the actors’ union, also went on strike — “This Fool” once again finds itself having to rely on fans to get the word out. Writers and actors are not permitted to promote their work until after the labor dispute is resolved.

It’s an unfortunate place to be for any show, but especially for a Latinx show.

I suspect Estrada would bristle at me referring to “This Fool” as such.

“We don’t look at the show through the lens of identity,” he told me in March. “We put funny first.”

“I just don’t think about it,” he later said to De Los contributing writer Alex Zaragoza for her story on what exactly makes a show Latinx.

“I just think about what I want to make and how I want to make it. I’ll just create something that feels authentic to me and maybe that’s it. … Somebody might tell me, ‘This Fool’ doesn’t represent me, and I go, ‘Oh, that’s good. That’s fine. It’s not supposed to. Maybe you can just like it.’”

It’s a valid response to have. No one likes to be pigeonholed, and I suspect the majority of artists would rather be judged on the quality of their work rather than their personal background.

To Estrada’s credit, “This Fool” is more than just the ethnicity of its characters. It’s an L.A. show, a working class comedy and an odd couple sitcom. It’s well-written and smart, while also being extremely sophomoric.

It’s because of these qualities that the comedy has been able to find an audience beyond L.A. Latinxs, beyond Mexican Americans like myself who appreciated the intentionality behind using the songs of Ramón Ayala and Cornelio Reyna in separate episodes.

But make no mistake about it: “This Fool” is very much a Latinx show. It also, in my opinion, happens to be good television. It is because of the latter that I’m writing about it yet again.

I’m uncertain what the future holds for the show — the second season premiered last Friday and as of right now there’s no indication if it will get a third. My hope is that it does. It’s a rarity that we get a television program whose main characters are working class Mexican Americans, much less one in which those same characters are afforded depth and dignity.

And if you happen to read this and end up watching “This Fool” because of it, make sure you tell a friend.

Things we read this week that we think you should read

— Columnist Suzy Exposito spoke to Raye Zaragoza ahead of the L.A folk artist’s debut at the Newport Folk Festival this Sunday. Among the subjects discussed was Zaragoza’s insistence on reclaiming the vaquerx.

— In her latest, Jean Guerrero told the devastating story of Jose Cervantes, an immigrant who built a life and family in Delaware, but returned to native Mexico after his father died.

— Q.E.P.D.: Roberto Cintli Rodríguez, one of the most prolific and important Chicanx writers of his generation, died on Monday at the age of 69 at his home in Mexico. El compa Gustavo Arellano wrote this wonderful obituary for his fellow columnist.

—If you haven’t checked out De Los yet, make sure you do so! Not only are we publishing stories for the Latinx community; we also have poetry, too!