Interview

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The last year and a half has been a transformative time for -Penélope Cruz. Her comically unhinged performance in Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) netted her an Academy Award. She completed her fourth film with Pedro Almodóvar, Broken Embraces, and joined the star--studded ensemble cast of Rob -Marshall’s new screen version of the Broadway musical Nine. But perhaps most -significantly, the 35-year-old Cruz has both reestablished and reinvented herself as an actress. It’s safe to say that, not too long ago, Cruz’s appearances at the multiplex—though plentiful and numerous—were largely overshadowed by her appearances in the tabloids. This was due to a variety of factors, chief among them a string of not-so-good -movies—did anyone see Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (2001)? Waking Up in Reno (2002)? Head in the Clouds (2004)?—which, however unfairly, fueled the perception that she could only act in her native Spanish, but also a succession of relationships that Cruz was reported to have had with her leading men, including Matt Damon (All the Pretty Horses, 2000), Matthew McConaughey (Sahara, 2005), and of course, Tom Cruise (Vanilla Sky, 2001). (Which, just as unfairly, fueled another perception about her that needs no further fueling).

The turning point for Cruz was her performance in Almodóvar’s 2006 film, Volver—an intensely dramatic but darkly funny film (Almodóvar outfitted Cruz with a prosthetic rear for the role) in which she played a working-class woman who discovers that her husband has tried to rape her teenage daughter and that her sister has begun receiving what she believes to be visitations from their dead mother—which earned her both Golden Globe and Oscar nominations. Her performance in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, as a passionate but emotionally volatile artist who is intent on maintaining the white-knuckled grip she has on her ex-husband’s (Javier Bardem) heart, was equally combustible; Cruz’s unrelenting fire and intelligence not only propelled the comedy but lent it an emotional weight.

When Cruz made her first American movie, The Hi-Lo Country (1998)—which was directed by a Brit, Stephen Frears—she spoke very little English. But even as her language skills improved, the chief attraction for directors often seemed to be her dark Castilian beauty: She was routinely cast as sexy temptresses, hot-tempered Latinas, and clichéd exotic foreigners. A big reason for her recent resurgence is that Almodóvar and Allen managed to tap into an aspect of her makeup that’s easy to miss if you linger on the surface: that while so much of being a leading lady in American cinema is about projecting an idealized vision, Cruz does her best work when she’s allowed to revel in the messiness of life—digging away at characters and searching for the ugly things they don’t want -others to know, the passions they can’t seem to contain, the dreams they want to fulfill, and the realities that they don’t want to confront. There isn’t a lack of ego in Cruz’s work—she will tell you as much. Nor is there a distrust of vanity. But it’s the jagged edges that have defined Cruz’s most memorable performances: in Bigas Luna’s Jamon Jamon (1992); in Alejandro Amenábar’s Open Your Eyes (1997); in Almodóvar’s All About My Mother (1999) and Volver; in Vicky Cristina Barcelona.

Read Pedro Almodóvar’s interview here.

Videos about Cruz's upcoming films:

Nine, which is out in December, is a departure—a musical that required Cruz to both sing and dance. The film, which is loosely based on Federico Fellini’s 8 ½ (1963), stars -Daniel Day-Lewis as an Italian director who struggles to contain relationships with the various women in his life: his long--suffering wife (Marion Cotillard), his sexpot mistress (Cruz), his overbearing mother (Sophia Loren), his temperamental star (the ex–Mrs. Cruise, Nicole Kidman), a journalist from Vogue (Kate Hudson), his longtime costume designer (Judi Dench), and a prostitute (the Black Eyed Peas’ Stacy “Fergie” -Ferguson). Late one Sunday night in October, Cotillard, an Oscar winner herself for her performance as Edith Piaf in 2007’s La Vie en Rose, reconnected with Cruz from Los Angeles, where the French-born actress was filming Christopher Nolan’s new film, Inception, with Leonardo DiCaprio. Cruz was in Bali, where Bardem—her three-time leading man and real-life love interest—was shooting Eat, Pray, Love with Julia Roberts.

MARION COTILLARD: I think one of the main things about being an actor is trying to understand people. So let’s start by talking about this for a moment. Imagine that you meet some extraterrestrials. How would you describe humankind to them?

PENÉLOPE CRUZ: That question actually brings me to the reason why I decided to become an actress, which is my constant curiosity about the endless mysteries of human behavior. Because we are dealing with the beauty and complexity of human confusion, no? And we are always trying to get answers.

COTILLARD: So you would describe humans to the extraterrestrials as mysterious and complex...

CRUZ: Well, they would never be bored studying us, that’s for sure.

COTILLARD: Were you always interested in becoming an actress?