This article analyzes the transnational persona of actress Kate del Castillo across her portrayals of female narcotraffickers, her transmedia interactions with audiences, and her pursuit of a film project on the life of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, former leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. Through discourse and textual analysis of news coverage, popular media, and first-person testimonials, this article argues that del Castillo’s persona of a rogue entrepreneur on-screen and off-screen shaped her success and made her a target for state and media organizations. Del Castillo’s narrative struggles across media and languages countered longstanding conceptions of women’s roles in narcotrafficking and in narco-cultural productions. The article illuminates the continued appeal that the cultural grammar of narcotrafficking holds as a way to articulate power in North America.
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