Julio Torres

And these flourishes just sort of come out as a way of explaining that.

I mean, all the catch-22s of the immigration system, the needing to pay for a visa but not being allowed to work for it, which implies you should have had the money from somewhere else that isn't working, even though the reality of so many people in this country, and especially immigrants in this country, is living paycheck to paycheck, you know?

It's like...

The fact that I would have $6,000 saved somewhere, it was just laughable.

I mean, when I was doing it, yeah, I don't doubt that it's more expensive now.

In my experience, around $6,000, which includes the government fees, but also the fees for the lawyer that because it's such a complex system, you don't want to get rejected because you failed something wrong.

And they certainly make it so you're dependent on lawyers.

Yeah.

So the film takes place during the time of me transitioning from a student visa to a work visa.

But even when I was moving on from a work visa to an artist visa, which is the last visa I had, part of the requirement was to show that I had a established career in the U.S.

that warranted an artist visa.

But at the same time, I had to throw the needle of not making it seem like I had been working and making money as an artist because that would have been illegal because I didn't have an artist visa yet.

Originally, I came to the U.S.

with a student visa, and then I had a work visa, and then I had to go from a work visa to an artist visa because under the work visa, I wasn't able to earn money as a stand-up comedian or writer or anything creative because that's not what the work visa is for.

By showing a wealth of experience that had come for free, that had come from earning no money, which is sort of like the only way that you can thread that needle.

Oh, I mean, the irony of that is that it's not hard to establish a...

a reputable career as an artist for no money.

Yeah, so it's not that big of an issue to show that you've done hundreds of shows for free because that is the truth of pursuing something creative.

By that point, I had done enough stand-up that getting the artist's visa was not that difficult.

What was difficult was, again, getting the money for it.