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).This passage, toward the end of the interview, is my favorite:
COTILLARD: You said about your character in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Maria Elena, that she thinks she will not be creative if she’s not torturing herself. Do you think we as actors need to keep the connection with our failures to be able to do our jobs with depth and authenticity—you know, the dark side?
CRUZ: Yeah, I mean, maybe. It’s actually a similar thing to the ego, because you don’t want to let that go. You have to look deeply inside of yourself to find something to use in your work. But the older I am, the more I refuse to treat my work as therapy and the more I think it’s less honest to do that, less about acting. When I was younger, I sometimes used personal things in creating characters, to the point where I thought maybe it was a little bit dangerous—at least for me. But I don’t feel that somebody can only be good in a character if they are really becoming that person or really suffering. I have played with that before, especially with emotional scenes, and there have been times when I have been close to throwing up because it was hard to get out of that place. It’s always a bigger challenge when it’s a dark character or something very emotionally difficult, but I think my purpose is to find a way where you can have a dance with that, where you go and you come back, instead of maybe being in that state for weeks.
Wow, what an acceptance speech from Penelope Cruz. That was her mother she kissed. She used her extra tickets to bring her brother, sister, and her childhood friend. Her dad went with her to the Golden Globes and Baftas. She told us ahead of time she was not going to prepare a speech. She opened with such a nice moment - "Has anyone ever fainted up here? I might be the first" and then ending with a salute to the unity of the Oscars and wrapping up in Spanish.**********
7:43: Best Supporting Actress ... a stripper need never take off her dignity with her clothes... blah blah... bullshit. Ugh! this is boring. So so stilted. But yay! Penélope Cruz, won. I love her.**********
The producers ... have dissed last year's actor winners by deciding that France's Marion Cotillard (Best Actress for La Vie En Rose) and Spain's Javier Bardem (Best Supporting Actor for No Country For Old Men), Scotland's Tilda Swinton (Best Supporting Actress for Michael Clayton) and even England's Daniel Day-Lewis (Best Actor for There Will Be Blood) weren't big enough names to carry on the time-honored tradition of announcing this year's winners by themselves. So, I've learned, the unusual step will be taken to bring onstage from a riser 5-person groups of other Best Actor or Best Supporting Actress winners from past eras in order to add more glitz and glamor to the presentations.
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UPDATE V: Check again at the Los Angeles Times' entertainment page for all the news and glamour on tonight's awards show. The New York Times has a big wrap up, "A ‘Slumdog’ Kind of Night at the Oscar Ceremony ."
I felt badly at the end of the broadcast, when Sean Penn won Best Actor for Milk, for all the other nominees would did not win. I'll never forget in 1997, Juliette Binoche won Best Actress for her role in The English Patient. She beat out Lauren Bacall, the grand dame of film noir of the 1940s, who had been nominated her very first time for The Mirror Has Two Faces. Bacall was visibly shaken at not winning the award, and there have been other times where the cameras flash across the faces, only to register the pain of loss.
I didn't get a look at Mickey Rourke tonight, but I'm sure it may well have been heartbreaking for him to come so far on his comeback and lose out at the end. That's some brutal competition.
It's a strange thing, all of it.
With phenomenal performances in some recent winners, including last year’s Woody Allen gem, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, thanks to which she now has an Oscar on her mantel, Cruz is poised to become a new member of the tiny firmament of actresses who began their careers in a language other than English and went on to become truly international stars: the Marlene Dietrichs, Greta Garbos, Ingrid Bergmans, Sophia Lorens, Anouk Aimées, Catherine Deneuves, Jeanne Moreaus, and Liv Ullmanns. Like some of those actresses, Cruz isn’t cookie-cutter pretty—she even has a bit of a schnoz—but her unusual features come together in a memorable aria of real beauty.Read the whole thing at the link.
When "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" debuted in May 2007, many critics derided the third installment in the Disney franchise, calling its plot incomprehensible and 169-minute running time torturous. Newsweek prayed it was the final movie in the series; the New Yorker said a monkey delivered the best performance in the film; and Time suggested an alternative title for the picture: "Pirates of the Caribbean: At Wit's End."That "Fast Five" is of the "Fast and Furious" series, which has already made a cool $140 million and could get a sixth installment.
Yet rather than sheath their swords, Johnny Depp and Co. restocked the eyeliner supply and relaced the corsets, signing on a little more than one year later for a fourth go-round. The copious haul of doubloons that Capt. Jack Sparrow pocketed worldwide suggested that with a little freshening of the franchise, audiences might be lured back aboard for yet another film.
"Even though the reviewers weren't crazy about the third one, it did almost a billion dollars. That's a big movie," says "Pirates" producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who, along with Disney, a new director ("Chicago" helmer Rob Marshall) and a new supporting cast, including Penélope Cruz, will bring another adventure in the eye-patch saga to theaters this week. "If we do a little less [money] on the fourth one, we'd be happy."
The return of "Pirates of the Caribbean" on Friday (this one is titled "On Stranger Tides") is part of a major shift in Hollywood, with studios now routinely pursuing a fourth picture in a series, often after an extended layoff — or even a fifth, in the case of Universal's current hit "Fast Five."
Penélope Cruz, in the midst of the dizzying heat of Cannes, is Tatler's August issue cover star https://t.co/nwz0kg2XJu pic.twitter.com/xjkZH5VzDe
— Tatler (@Tatlermagazine) June 21, 2019
Penélope Cruz sets pulses racing in a VERY sultry photoshoot https://t.co/Vaf6jLGgIl
— Daily Mail Celebrity (@DailyMailCeleb) June 22, 2019
The Toronto International Film Festival rounded out its 2012 program Tuesday with new titles by master directors like Michael Haneke and Bernardo Bertolucci as well as a star-studded guest list spanning Robert Redford, Penelope Cruz, Johnny Depp and Vanessa Redgrave.More at that top link.
Organizers unveiled a slate of announcements, including final additions to the festival's movie lineup, details of its popular Mavericks talk series, its annual list of expected attendees and news that the fest was opening up its previously industry-only documentary conference to the public.
Set to present 372 films in total (289 feature-length and 83 short films), TIFF expects a galaxy of international stars to descend on Toronto for this year's festivities.
If u are married with children - do you think it is appropriate to go around talking about how hot other women are all the time? Your blog is full of drooling over how hot women on TV are. Why don't you stop fawning over actors and fake celebrities and pay more attention to reality. Where are your "Christian" morals? Or are you just a typical male hypocrite, a common politician , another talking head on TV preaching how others should live their lives?The second one is from "Suzie Q," which is the nom de plume of a paleocon reader who spews the same old neo-isolationist (anti-American) talking points as Daniel Larison and the airheads over at Conservative Heritage. I'd bet Suzie Q is in fact a sockpuppet for one of the writers there, Old Rebel, or just could be some spineless lurker who likes taking pot shots from the shadows. In any case, here's Suzie Q's remark (in response to this post):
Donald, thank you for quoting me and beginning a discussion on the matter. I sincerely believe you've been brainwashed. I think you're wonderful on many fronts, but all anyone has to do is say, "Al Qaeda!" and it's like Pavlov ringing the bell. Neocons salivate and say, "Grow the Government! Give up our liberties! It's for 'freedom'!" Uh-huh. Right. Ummmmm... please slow down and re-evaluate the logic. The Patriot Act preserves no liberty - and provides security for the Government against conservatives, patriots, veterans, pro-lifers, and anyone who doesn't agree with statism. The Patriot Act really isn't "about" protecting us from "Al Qaeda". The Patriot Act is about statists gaining power over... conservatives. (And I'm still waiting for conservatives to stop salivating and taking the bait every time statists say, "Al Qaeda!") You see, Donald, it's a matter of PRINCIPLE. The Bill of Rights cannot be "negotiable" in the threat of a "terrorist" - or like Hitler found necessity to propagandize to create the Jew as an object of fear... the statists today find necessity to propagandaize to create "Al Qaeda" as an object of fear. SS - DHS... same difference... same pattern... same program... and I pray conservatives wake up before the knock comes to their door. Love ya, Donald, but what's it going to take to "just say no" to the DHS??Okay, first to "anonymous." Normally anonymous comments are deleted, since I don't like responding to a non-entity, and it's generally cowardly to attack someone while being unwilling to face them publically (although butt freak E.D. Kain's recent workplace intimidation campaign makes me much more sympathetic to serious bloggers who remain anonymous).
In the October issue, Vanity Fair special correspondent Maureen Orth reports that in 2004 Scientology embarked on a top-secret project headed by Shelly Miscavige, wife of Scientology chief David Miscavige, which involved finding a girlfriend for Tom Cruise. According to several sources, the organization devised an elaborate auditioning process in which actresses who were already Scientology members were called in, told they were auditioning for a new training film, and then asked a series of curious questions including: “What do you think of Tom Cruise?” Marc Headley, a Scientologist from age seven, who says he watched a number of the audition videotapes when he was head of Scientology’s in-house studio, tells Orth, “It’s not like you only have to please your husband—you have to toe the line for Scientology.” Both Nicole Kidman and Penélope Cruz ran afoul of Scientology and David Miscavige, according to another former Scientologist. “You can’t do anything to displease Scientology, because Tom Cruise will freak out,” Headley says. (Scientology representatives deny that any such search took place and have dismissed several of the story’s sources as disgruntled apostates. David Miscavige and Tom Cruise declined to be interviewed.)Definitely bizarre.
According to Orth, Nazanin Boniadi, an Iranian-born, London-raised actress and Scientologist, was selected and dated Cruise from November 2004 until January 2005. Initially she was told only that she had been selected for a very important mission. In a month-long preparation in October 2004, she was audited every day, a process in which she told a high-ranking Scientology official her innermost secrets and every detail of her sex life. Boniadi allegedly was told to lose her braces, her red highlights, and her boyfriend. According to a knowledgeable source, she was shown confidential auditing files of her boyfriend to expedite a breakup. (Scientology denies any misuse of confidential material.) The source says Boniadi signed a confidentiality agreement and was told that if she “messed up” in any way she would be declared a Suppressive Person (a pariah and enemy of Scientology).
I spent my morning on MSNBC talking about right/left opposition to the mandate. What about you? ...
I guess Mark Thompson can dig it.
