After her win of the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her work on Vicky Christina Barcelona, Penélope Cruz will be even more visible through 2009, as she stars in Pedro Almodovar’s Broken Embraces, and co-stars with Marion Cotillard, Kate Hudson, Nicole Kidman, Dame Judi Dench, Sophia Loren, Fergie (the one from Black Eyed Peas) and Daniel Day-Lewis in Nine, Rob Marshall’s musical remake of Federico Fellini’s classic, 8½, both due to hit theatres this November.
Earl Dittman caught up with the talented Spanish beauty about those films, and her Academy Award-winning role, presumably when she stopped for a moment to catch her breath.
What can fans expect from Los Abrazos Rotos (Broken Embraces) your new film with old friend and collaborator Pedro Almodovar?
“I think it’s going to be a really beautiful movie.”
Is it a comedy?
“No, it’s a drama but then I play an actress. The character that my character plays is comedy. There is a very pop comedy inside the drama that is very much noir theatre. I don’t know if I should say that, but I’m really blown away by Pedro’s talent again. It’s amazing.”
What kind of rehearsals did you have to go through for the film version of the stage musical Nine?
“A lot of singing and dancing.”
So, can you really sing and dance?
“They say I can sing. [Laughs] I did five auditions for the movie, I really wanted to do Nine, and I was very, very, very excited that I got to do it. I trained for 17 years as a dancer. Now, I get to use that, and I’m doing it with the singing. I did all the auditions, I took lessons, and we trained very hard. I’m so excited.”
[Cruz, seated on the left, is part of a mind boggling array of feminine talent, beauty and charm (plus Fergie) in a still from Nine]
You got to work with Woody Allen in Vicky Christina Barcelona.Woody said that you actually approached him about doing the film. Did you find out he was doing a film in Barcelona and wanted to contact him?
“I think it was my agent that called and said, ‘We found out you were doing a movie in Spain. Do you want to meet Penelope?’ We met in Europe for a very short meeting. It was less than one minute. He told me, ‘I saw Volver, and I’m writing a story but it’s not finished yet. If it gets going in this direction, the script, I think you could be right for this part.’
You portrayed [VCB's]Maria Elena as a woman that is very passionate, animated and a little bit on the edge of crazy. Does that make it hard to see her as a human being or to inhabit her as a person?
“No, the opposite. I think that one of the worst things that can happen to someone is to feel trapped in your own head, like she feels. She is stuck in the role of the victim. Somebody told her when she was growing up that she was a genius. They told her she was too special to be happy. If she wanted to stay special she had to torture herself. She has believed those ideas. That is not in the movie, but I wondered who that person was, it was in her head forever. She believed it, and she keeps feeding the monster. Everyone is telling her all the time that she is so special. She thinks to maintain that she has to keep destroying herself.
Do you like to suffer while playing a character?
“It’s not that I like it, it’s just that some characters are doing that in a space. They are more exhausting, emotionally. I don’t like doing that on purpose. I don’t think you are only good if you are suffering. Some characters require you to be in a very extroverted, quiet and peaceful space while you are making them. This one was not like that, but I remember I was very exhausted when I was with her.”
You are quite an accomplished photographer…
“Thank you. You know, I’d be taking pictures for a living if I didn’t love acting so much.”
What are some of your favorite subjects to take photos of?
“Everything. I usually always have a camera with me, because I love taking pictures of the sky, people on the set and even people walking on the street.”
Haven’t you also found a unique way to turn the tables on the paparazzi?
[Laughs] “Yes. Since I always have a camera with me, and if a tabloid photographer is behind me, taking pictures, I turn around and go, ‘Can I take your picture? I’d really like to.’ It really shocks them, they don’t know what to do. If they say no, I go, ‘Well, you have been taking my picture all day, I think that’s only fair, don’t you?’ They usually say something under their breath and walk away. But, I have had a few tell me, ‘Sure, go ahead.’ And I’ll take a couple of pictures of them and they’ll ask for a couple of me and they go away. It’s actually worked out pretty good for me.”
How did you like working with Woody Allen?
“I loved it. Woody is so clever. I think he managed to make all of us forget that we were doing a comedy. When I saw the movie in Cannes with an audience for the first time, I was so surprised and blown away by how much people were laughing. For me, I was doing the most serious and painful drama ever … I had completely forgotten, until I saw it months later, that it was funny.”
