Our most international actress, without a doubt, is Penélope Cruz. But… do you know her entire filmography?
“I grew up in a place called Alcobendas, where this was not a very realistic dream.” Do you remember those words? Well you should, because they are the history of our cinema. It has been 11 years since that moment, the moment that changed our cinema forever (or one of the most recent turning points): Penélope Cruz won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona’, by Woody Allen.
“My first audition was for the woman who became my manager and still works with me,” recalls the actress. “She auditioned for about 300 actors. I was 14 years old and she had me read a scene from ‘Casablanca’ (1942), something impossible to do at that age. But my representative asked me if I wanted to work with her and sent me some castings. At 16, I got ‘Jamón, Jamon’ (1992). Of course, I had to lie about my age. And I had to lie to my parents about the content of the script.”
Penélope Cruz was already a star, both in Spanish cinema and abroad. She is the exotic, but strong and rebellious Latina that she likes so much in the United States, with a touch of folklore, of ‘echá pa’lante’ that captivated American, European and Spanish directors. But let’s remember her debut, and it couldn’t be more Spanish: the Mecano video clip ‘La Fuerza del Destino’.
Since then, Penélope Cruz has not stopped working. Her first approach to her Oscar was with the film ‘Belle Epoque’ (which rolled after the erotic ‘Ham Ham’with her now husband Javier Bardem) and the 90s served for her launch as an actress, with films like ‘The apple of your eyes’ or ‘Love seriously harms health’.
“Work-wise, it always feels like a first date,” she explains. “I mean, every time I go on set and start a project, I get the same feeling, those butterflies in my stomach and not having control over it, because acting is like that. That’s the beauty of it. You can always keep learning. There’s always more.”
His romance with actor Tom Cruise gave much to talk about at the end of the decade and helped boost his career in Hollywood, with titles like ‘Vanilla Sky’, ‘All the beautiful horses’ or Gothika’. But her real turning point came with the Almodovarian ‘Volver’, which earned her her first Oscar nomination. Today, she is our most famous actress, and there is no director or director who does not want to work with her. But, among all her filmography… which movie would you save?
Source: Fotogramas
Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
