With 10 nominations at this Sunday’s 82nd Golden Globe Awards, the most of any film in contention, and multiple wins at the 2024 European Film Awards, Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez” has clearly had an effect on many, but perhaps its greatest impact was felt by the film’s star, Zoe Saldaña. During THR’s Actress Roundtable, the “Lioness” actress shared that after years of laborious productions on franchises like James Cameron’s “Avatar” and Marvel’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Avengers” films, with “Emilia Pérez,” she finally got to break free of the boundaries these films entail.
“I fell into this pattern of being on autopilot constantly. I was a part of really successful films that became franchises, and I have no regrets. They gave me so much. But they’re very time-consuming,” said Saldaña. “And this is all happening while I’m starting a family. So that desire to grow, to shatter whatever glass ceiling I felt like I was falling under, was growing more and more as the years went by.”
Saldana separately made clear to IndieWire’s Marcus Jones in a recent interview that she appreciates her franchise work, even acknowledging James Cameron as “the first director that gave me a platform to fully execute a character from beginning to end. And there was no such thing ever as a bad decision or a stupid question. Whether or not my role was this small or that big, I felt so important. I felt so heard and seen.”
Acting in “Emilia Pérez” was especially liberating for Saldana, who told IndieWire of the Audiard musical, “I went all in. I felt her spirit, and I felt that a lot more people were going to find themselves in Rita.”
At a certain point, she gave a list to her representatives with the “top five directors” she was dying to work for.
“Jacques [Audiard] was in the top three,” Saldaña said in the THR roundtable. “Dancing and singing, that was the icing on the cake.”
Saldaña described getting her part in “Emilia Pérez” as a “true gift” that allowed her to “reconnect” with parts of herself she’d moved past without realizing it, especially her musical side and personal history.
“As a New Yorker, you’re born with jazz hands, and then you spend your whole life un-jazzing your hands,” said Saldaña. “I remember being a child and walking by Lincoln Center and [my grandmother] would go, ‘Look, look, look,’ while she was smoking her cigarette, like, ‘One day, one day you’re going to be there.’ And I remember thinking like, ‘What is she saying?’ And then it’s very beautiful when things come full circle.”
Prior to making “Emilia Pérez” was not the only time in Saldaña’s career she felt at odds with the path in front of her. Early in her professional life, as a “daughter of immigrants” and “being Latina in America,” the actress felt she had to shoulder the weight of representing her entire community, but quickly realized it wouldn’t serve her interests or well-being.
“I stopped that. I made that choice. I hoped it would help my community, by me following my heart and growing as an artist, as opposed to trying to take on these social causes,” Saldana told her fellow actresses. “Because I would feel really overwhelmed. And when you do connect with people from your community, then you’re able to look at them and say, ‘Follow your heart.’ That’s how you are going to help your community, by helping yourself.”
Watch all of THR’s Actress Roundtable below.
“Emilia Pérez” is currently streaming on Netflix.
SOURCE: IndieWire
