Celebrity Gossip / By Liz Smith
The vibrant Penelope Cruz
“W henHarvey Weinstein is happy, it’s easier on the rest of the world!”
That’s best supporting actress nominee Penelope Cruz, accurately summing up the gregarious/volcanic mogul/producer Mr. Weinstein. Harvey has plenty to be happy about these days. Miss Cruz is nominated for “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.” “The Reader” — also from the Weinstein Company — copped five Oscar nominations, including best actress for Kate Winslet and best picture. After two years of iffy projects, the heat is on again for HW.
I spoke to Penelope Cruz last weekend. She was calling from somewhere in the hills of Los Angeles, on a cell phone. At first, the signal died, and I thought, oh well, modern technology! But Penelope didn’t give up. She got to a landline.
Cruz has the sort of vital personality that leaps right off the screen, and right through phone wires too. She pulls you in. (When I met her in the flesh a few years back, I was blown away by her lively intelligence, her energy and, needless to say, her beauty!) It’s hard to believe this vibrant star was thought to be something of a “flop” in American films, with the early disappointments of “All the Pretty Horses” and “Vanilla Sky.” Also hard to believe she was ever involved with Tom Cruise. That friendship, which blossomed in the wake of his divorce from Nicole Kidman, was tabloid fodder only nine years ago, but it seems like 20, somehow.
She says she is thrilled to have been nominated again. (Her first bid for Oscar was 2006’s “Volver,” directed by her old friend and mentor, Pedro Almodovar.) “Although, I have to call my family every day, in Spain, to calm them down, so they don’t get too hopeful.” Cruz took ballet for nine years at Spain’s National Academy. With that training, has she ever played a dancer? “No, I haven’t. But I did get to dance and sing and a lot else in ‘Nine.’ I do the number ‘A Phone Call to the Vatican,’ which has me performing with ropes. I hadn’t danced at all in 14 years. I practiced that number every day, five hours a day from August to November. When we finally shot it, I was so sad when it was all over. It had become part of my life.”
The movie “Nine,” an adaptation of Tommy Tune’s Broadway hit (based on Fellini’s famous film “8z”) also stars Sophia Loren, Judi Dench, Nicole Kidman, Marion Cotillard, Stacy Ferguson and Kate Hudson. It is one of 2009’s most eagerly awaited events. And it is another Weinstein Company effort. Ah, yes, the world is breathing easier!
Up next for Penelope is “Broken Embraces,” once again paired with Pedro Almodovar. She raves over her friend, “He is a genius. He writes the most incredible roles for women. In this one, ‘Broken Embraces,’ I am an actress playing two roles, one comedy, one drama, one real-life, one the movie she is making. It’s complex, mind-blowing. I am so lucky to have him in my life.”
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