Get used to seeing these faces this awards season. diversity The 10 Actors to Watch in 2026 hit the stage in Newport Beach, Calif., on October 18 for a conversation about performance, craft, and process. Diversity This conversation was co-hosted with the Newport Beach Film Festival.
The panel, which started at Balboa Bay Resort, highlighted this year’s selection: Jaafar Jackson (“Michael”), Inde Navarrette (“Obsession”), Ray Nicholson (“The Mosquito Bowl”), Esmé Creed-Miles (“Sense and Sensibility”), Mariana Di Girólamo (“Wild Horse Nine”), Rosalind Eleazar (“Misty Green”), Guitarricadelafuente (“La Bola Negra”), Summer H. Howell (“Carrie”), Ruth Madeley (“Being Heumann”) and Joseph Zada (“The Hunger Games: Sunrise During the Harvest”).
During the conversation, Navarrette talked about playing Nikki and the difficulty of developing the character because there was so little. real Nikki in “Obsession”.
“This was actually the first opportunity where I had the freedom to do whatever I could to some degree,” he said. “I think the complexity of Nikki is the best thing about her. I see people come up and talk to me about her, especially women, and say, ‘This is a character I find myself in.’ Of course, people love to laugh, but I see a complexity not just in women, but in all of us humans, who are more than one person, and that’s beautiful.”
Esmé Creed-Miles, Rosalind Eleazar, Mariana di Girolamo, Guitarricadelafuente, Summer Howell, Jaafar Jackson, Ruth Madeley, Inde Navarrette, Ray Nicholson and Joseph Zada join the Newport Beach Film Festival HONOURS.
Getty Images for Newport Beach Film Festival
Jackson also talked about his process of becoming his uncle, Michael Jackson, not only about his skills as an artist but also about his self-confidence.
“I just wanted it to look like I’d made movies before. I didn’t want to be seen as a first-time actor. Of course, I wanted to be able to continue learning, but I wanted to have that presence and awareness of how to walk into a room, how to pull it in any direction, because it doesn’t always go as planned or what’s on the page,” he said. “Something could happen one day, and I was experiencing that, and I was happy to be able to prepare for that and be in the space for Michael to do that, just to be able to continue to be in Michael’s head.
Watch part one of the video above and part two below: