‘Sesame Street’ star Sonia Manzano received the Impact Award at Miami FF.

Actress days Sonia Manzano Bringing a handkerchief with you when you go out in public can be quite helpful. Fans tend to respond to her with deep emotions.

They know and love Manzano. sesame streetThis is a show where she shined specially for 44 years, playing the role of Maria from 1971 to 2015. As the first Latina to appear regularly on national television, the documentary explores her impact on American culture. Street Smart: Lessons from a TV Iconjust screened miami film festival.

supervision Ernie Bustamante I spent the better part of a decade working on this project.

“I remember one day in Los Angeles we were having coffee and a woman came up to us and burst into tears,” he recalls. “I remember one executive doing that over a Zoom call because it was such an important part of his life.”

The film, which premiered at the 2025 Bentonville Film Festival, traces Manzano’s journey growing up in the South Bronx as the daughter of Puerto Rican immigrants. She attended Manhattan High School for the Performing Arts before enrolling at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. When she was an undergraduate, she briefly caught a glimpse of a new children’s show on PBS. sesame streetAnd it won’t be long before you join the cast. Show executives provided only basic instructions for the role.

“They didn’t give me any direction. They said, ‘Maria, it’s just who you are,'” Manzano told Deadline. “I was very self-conscious. I didn’t know what to do.”

“There are some great lines in the movie,” she added. color of money. I think Paul Newman said, ‘You have to be yourself intentionally.’ And I think that’s a great statement. And I just kept peeling back the layers and making it feel as real as possible.”

Her sincerity resonated with millions of viewers, including future director Ernie Bustamante. He remembers first seeing her on TV in the “1980s.” “Growing up, I watched Sonia Manzano and Emilio Delgado as Maria and Luis on Sesame Street. I’m Puerto Rican and Mexican myself, so when I saw them on TV, it reminded me of my parents. Latinas like Maria are rarely portrayed positively on TV.”

Bustamante continues, “Maria on sesame street It was grounded and realistic, but she also had a sense of humor. Her scene with Oscar the Grouch, and we’ll take a look at that scene from the movie. What a comedy duo they were. Latinos are often caricatured on mainstream television. Sonia says this in the movie as well. It’s still the same old story, and it’s true today. And what you see on TV is… It stayed the same, but it’s really refreshing to know that I had those TV role models early on and never forgot them.”

Manzano has won 15 Emmy Awards as a writer. sesame streetIn 2016, she received a Lifetime Achievement Daytime Emmy Award, an honor bestowed by another icon, EGOT winner Rita Moreno. At the Miami Film Festival, Manzano received MFF’s Impact Award in recognition of a career that includes her pioneering work. sesame street producing an animation series Alma’s Way For PBS Kids, she also played the role of Granny Isa.

“I am very happy and delighted to be honored,” she said. “This means something special to me because more people in the Latin community are looking up to me, so when they say I am an inspiration, I hope it inspires others as well.”

The documentary is being screened at a time when the Trump administration is attacking diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives that promote visibility and opportunity for minorities and throwing an ax to public television over its ideological suspicions.

Street Smart: Lessons from a TV Icon“It’s a happy, inspirational story,” Bustamante said. “And when we sit down with audiences, people are looking for inspiration, they’re looking for a reminder of why representation matters… why inclusivity matters. It’s a wonderful reminder of the stories in movies and mass media. If it weren’t for mass media, the fully formed character of Maria wouldn’t exist.”

Manzano says, “People are looking for a simple answer to why we should care about diversity, why DEI is important, and that’s because we’re forced to look at the problem from different perspectives, which leads to different solutions to the same problem. So when the solution is a monoculture that’s better and faster and many people are trying to support and embrace it, that’s going to be a terrible thing to lose. We’re not going to get the answers we need as quickly as possible.”

Street Smart: Lessons from a TV Icon Performed at DOC NYC and the Doc Soup Series at Hot Docs Cinema in Toronto, and at the Bentonville and Miami Film Festivals. “What we’re trying to do in the fall is impact testing,” says the director. “At the same time, I’m working with my producers, one of whom is Steven Canals. pose — And contact (distributor)… Ideally, it would be great for it to air on television because Sonia is famous for appearing on television.”

“Sonia means a lot to a lot of people, so the conversations we’re having are really inspiring,” Bustamante adds.