Actress MJ Rodriguez was nominated for an Emmy on Tuesday for her role in the groundbreaking series Pose. With the. nomination, she makes history as the first transgender person to secure an Emmy nomination for best actress in a primetime series — and her mama's awfully proud. 

The actress recorded her response to being nominated for best lead actress in a drama. In it, her mother, Audrey Rodriguez, showed unyielding support for her daughter. 

"You deserve it baby, you deserve it!" Audrey can be heard saying over and over again off-camera

When discussing how she captured the essence of her Pose character, Blanca, aside from drawing inspiration from the other trans women in her life, Rodriguez cited her mother as her main prototype.

"The main skeleton — infrastructure — of Blanca is literally Audrey Rodriguez," the New Jersey native told NJ.com. "My mother was my source of nurturing, she was my source of comfort, and most importantly, she was my source of womanhood from birth."

"That is the woman who I emulate, and that is also the woman that I wanted to present on the television screen to show how good mothers are out there, and to also show that there’s a lot of work that goes into mothering resilient children," she continued.

According to Deadline, Rodriguez is the third openly transgender person to be nominated for an Emmy in the awards' 72-year history. She was preceded by actress and filmmaker Rain Valdez, who scored an Emmy nomination in 2020 for the series Razor Tongue , and Laverne Cox, who was the first transgender actor nominated for an Emmy after her performance in Orange Is The New Black.

“I do believe this is a pivotal moment. There’s never been a trans woman who has been nominated as a leading outstanding actress and I feel like that pushes the needle forward so much for now the door to be knocked down for so many people — whether they be male or trans female, gender nonconforming, LGBTQIA+, it does not matter,” Rodriguez told Variety. 

“A moment like this extends and opens and elongates the possibilities of what’s going to happen and I believe the Academy is definitely making it possible and their eyes are more than open. Yes, I do believe they’re going to continue, and I also feel like we’re going to keep speaking and encouraging and informing and educating people around the world. I think that’s the most important thing," she added. 

Black-transgender-communityEmmy-nominationLGBTQ+MJ RodriguezPose FX