Eva Mendes

Interview By: Rocco Passafuime
RoccoPassafuime@TheCinemaSource.com

Eva Mendes is inarguably one of the most strikingly beautiful women in the world. Her face has graced fashion and beauty product lines worldwide for Revlon and Calvin Klein and her body has been graced in the flesh artfully for magazines ranging from Maxim to Flaunt to Italian Vogue to even the notorious anti-fur ads of PETA.

But Mendes has managed to buck the potential stereotype of the shallow supermodel actress. She has garnered roles in a diverse array of films ranging from Training Day, 2 Fast 2 Furious, Hitch, Ghost Rider, and We Own The Night.

Now Eva's latest role is in a new film remake of Claire Boothe Luce's play The Women, which she joins an all-star cast of female talent with notables such as Meg Ryan, Annette Bening, Debra Messing, and Jada Pinkett Smith.

We first asked the now 34 year old actress how it felt being part of such a female-heavy cast in what has traditionally been a male-dominated industry.

'It was kind of surreal,' Eva recalls, 'When you see it, it's surreal, but because our experience was we had so many men on set, they just weren't in front of the camera. We had a cute assistant director or a really cute camera guy or the teamsters. There's plenty of cute boys around. there were plenty of men who were taking care of us in different ways and they were definitely around, yeah. There were strict guidelines, though.'I couldn't survive if it was just all girls.'

We asked Mendes to describe for us what to expect in an environment chock-full of female performers.

'Catfights,' Eva jokes, 'Debi [Mazar] and I got into a brawl on the first day and then, we were good. Yeah, that's what it took to be really good friends.'

However, Eva is quick to note that any potential tension long dissipated when director/screenwriter Diane English got her and the other noted actresses to bond together before filming was to start.

'About a month before the movie, Diane English invited us, some of us, to go to her house and rehearse for four days,' Mendes recounts, 'And I thought, are you sure' I just wasn't sure about it. And then, I went and happily, I mean, I really had a great time bonding with these women. It was me, Meg, Annette, Jada, and Debra.'

'The thing was it actually cut to me crying in the evening, because it was like camp,' she adds, 'It was like a quick bond and I think it was really great for Diane English to do that because whether or not I'm supposed to be the girl friend in the movie, with the glam or not, we still need chemistry. And I think I really made it easy for them to love to hate me, to add that little love/hate thing to me in the movie.'

The mostly female environment also did not prevent Eva from feeling slight embarrassment at doing a particularly risqu' scene in the film.

'I remember the day we had to do the lingerie scene with Meg Ryan,' she recalls, 'That day, I had to keep the lunch down to a minimum, because I'm literally wearing nothing, right, and that's not really fun for me because I'm a big eater, a big food grabber, I really enjoy food. But that was a tough day.

'The craft service guy, who was so sweet,' Mendes continues, 'At the end of the day, my favorite thing is chocolate covered almonds. He got me a thing this big of chocolate covered almonds and the scariest part is I had to end up sharing it, because I almost just did it all myself, did it all like it was this crazy thing I had to do, I almost ate them all.'

In the film, Mendes plays Crystal Allen, a perfume 'spritzer girl', whose involved in dalliances with a married Wall Street businessman. However, the actress insists Crystal is not your typical garden-variety mistress, she also stresses she's not the kind of person she ever wants to emulate.

'She's very desperate and she's not a bad person, because, you know, she's not evil or anything,' she explains, 'But certainly, she's desperate and she makes really bad decisions.'

Eva also said that it fell on herself to really add some new three-dimensional wrinkles to the formulaic mistress clich' of her character.

'I thought it was important in the movie to get to know where Crystal comes from. She's not just this cold-hearted bitch,' Mendes believes, 'She's actually just a desperate girl who's had nothing her whole life and she just wants a piece of the pie.'

'One of the biggest heartbreaks about being an actress, for me, is ending up on the cutting room floor when you feel you have something to offer in a certain scene,' she continues, '[There's a cut scene with Debi where] we see the have-nots together. It didn't really drive the movie, but I thought it was a nice added bonus.'

When asked whether or not she felt any similarities to her character, Mendes says that Crystal Allen is not the kind of person she ever wants to personally emulate.

'Oh, God, I really hope I don't have much in common with my character,' Eva continues, 'I personally think messing around with a married man is a really big deal and when there's a child involved, you better be ready to take responsibility and be called every name in the book because you are partially destroying a family. I don't believe that you can steal a husband, but I believe you can ruin a household and that is a major thing to carry on your shoulders.'

We asked the actress if she herself had any favorite scenes from The Women.

'I don't know,' Mendes replies, 'Debra Messing's birth was a fun scene. I was a little jealous I wasn't a part of it. I thought it would be funny if Debi and I showed up anyway. Crystal and Tanya showing up, it's like, what are you doing here' Like, we want to help!'

Mendes says that she particularly enjoyed working with Debi Mazar in particular, who plays fellow 'spritzer' Tanya.

'The day we would do the apartment scene together, it was me and Debi sneaking cigarettes in that room gabbing away non-stop,' she recalls, 'It was a total bonding moment. I was bonding with her on my side.'

In keeping with the theme of the movie, which is women bonding, we asked Eva if she could share with us the ideal girls' night out.

'Mine would be [very chill],' Eva believes, 'Mine would be taking my girl friends out. I've had the same girl friends since 7th grade. Some of them have been the same. I even take them to the premiere and everything, along with my mom and my sisters. I'd like to go out to dinner and introduce some kind of something to my friends that normally wouldn't frequent in a certain place, you know, ever have a certain type of cuisine. And I really take it upon myself to treat them.'

'I love to treat people,' she continues, 'I didn't know this about myself until recently. It's so fun. I love to pick up the check. It's not an ego thing and it's not a thing where I feel guilty of having. I've literally come to terms with that I love treating people that I love. I love treating my girl friends and having them order whatever they want. If they don't like it, order another plate. Not in a wasteful way, but like, let's enjoy this meal and let's just bond. You can take the girls our of junior high, but wow, while we get there, it's 7th grade all over again and it's all about boys and fashion and boys and fashion.'

With that in mind, we finally asked the actress whether she ever had concern of her circle of friends ever suffering the many tests of friendship endured through the course of The Women.

'You know, I have such a close-knit circle that goes back to 12 years old with some of these girls,' she says, 'Of course, my family, we have differences over certain things, but my sisters and my mom, I know for a fact they will never betray me. And like in the movie, if they ever did, let's say, it would be for such an amazing reason and I would want to know and we would grow from it.'

'It's just one of those things where I have a very tight circle,' Mendes continues, 'And I'm very good at reading people and the minute I read that you're trying to kiss up to me and possibly want a piece of my pie in the wrong way, you're not. I'm very easy to just not cultivate a friendship of wanting people around. I have my base, maybe six women in my life that I cannot live without and others come then and now. But that base for me, I feel really blessed that I have that.'