Director Patricia Riggen and Adrián Alonso on the set of Under the Same Moon Courtesy of Fox Searchlight

As this was your first feature film, weren't you hesitant about working with a young boy in the lead?
I know. I love working with actors. It was very challenging. I knew that if I didn't find the right actor, I shouldn't do it. I kept myself very close to him the whole time. My entire cast was very eclectic. I had very diverse actors, very different from each other. I have America Ferrera who is now a big star, I have a guy that comes from stand-up comedy who is the most famous comedian in Mexico and then I have Adrian [Alonso], the kid, and also some very experienced theater actors. So it was a challenge to keep them all in the same tone, belonging to the same world.

Did you struggle to get a cast together that you thought would help sell the movie ultimately?
No, because I shot the movie independently. I actually had a studio deal before but then I decided to do it one my own. So I raised the finances myself. I raised half of it in Mexico through a government fund that has financed the first films of those three directors from Mexico that you mentioned, Cuarón, Iñárritu and del Toro — they all started with the same fund with their first features. And then I got the other half from a private source in the U.S. Fortunately, they allow you to be completely free creatively so I didn't have to cast [a big name]. And I actually believe that getting a star is not what makes a movie good or not, and it is not what makes a movie sell or not. Audiences are not dumb. It doesn't matter if you have the biggest star. If the story doesn't work and doesn't connect, it is not going to work. I hope that producers and the studios start understanding that. It is about the story and about the script and about the director and the performances you get. Not about the stars.

Now that you have had this success, are you working on your next project?
Yeah, I have had several offers in Hollywood for much, much bigger movies... But then you know how it is in Hollywood: if you believe it, you're screwed. I am not going to believe that it is going to happen. And at the same time I am going to develop a couple of projects that I control, just in case the other ones don't come through. What I want to avoid is the second film syndrome of having a good success for a first feature and then you are waiting for five years. I don't want that to happen.