Mexican actress Kate del Castillo says ‘macho’ persecution followed El Chapo encounter

Mexican actress Kate del Castillo said Monday that her involvement in actor Sean Penn’s interview with drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman has cost her acting jobs and a “macho” Mexican government is persecuting her only because she’s a woman.

Del Castillo had to shoot her upcoming Netflix series Ingobernable — or Ungovernable — in the United States because she fears she’ll be detained if she returns to Mexico. The actress still faces government accusations of obstruction of justice and money laundering related to the 2015 meeting with the Sinaloa cartel leader, who was on the run after his second escape from a Mexican prison.

In an interview, del Castillo said she’s grateful to Netflix for standing by her.

“It’s not been a good year,” she said. “I couldn’t work because people didn’t want me, because they were afraid.”

Del Castillo, an animal rights activist, will launch a campaign Tuesday with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, calling on Miami Seaquarium to release its orca named Lolita into a coastal sanctuary. In videos produced by PETA in English and Spanish, del Castillo urges people to boycott marine parks.

Now living in Los Angeles, de Castillo said she won’t let her exile from Mexico dampen her activism, though she does worry about her parents’ security in Mexico. Del Castillo laughed at the irony of starring in Ingobernable as the first lady of Mexico (“The timing is no bueno for me,” she said), and she cautioned her fans and critics to remember the political series is fictional.