Archive for the ‘Articles’ Category
| Avatar: An Interview with Zoe Saldana | April 21st, 2010 |
Fans of Zoe Saldana will get a one-two punch from the actress this week with the April 22nd release of Avatar on Blue-ray and DVD, and the April 23rd release of The Losers in theatres. Earthsmightiest.com has a one-on-one interview with Saldana conducted shortly before Avatar was released.
When she’s not manning the communications console of the starship Enterprise or donning her motion capture outfit for Avatar, the odds are you’ll find Zoe Saldana getting her geek on with Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, the Travel Channel series in which the host travels around the world to feast on local cuisine — often times to the audience’s horror.
“I’m not known to watch things over and over again,” Saldana smiles sheepishly, “but I can watch his episodes over and over again. I totally freaking geek for Anthony Bourdain.”
Reassuringly, she also gets pleasure from Nintendo DS. “It stimulates my brain,” she offers matter of factly, “and I have this fear of becoming dumber as I get older. The brain is a muscle and if I don’t exercise my brain, then I’m going to be dumb. So I’m really hooked on Nintendo DS for brain activity.”
She’s also hooked on acting. Born on June 19, 1978 in New Jersey to a Dominican father and Puerto Rican mother, Saldana’s early roles include the Britney Spears vehicle Crossroads as well as the part of the pirate Anamarie in the original Pirates of the Caribbean before graduating to the roles of Uhura in Abrams’ take on Star Trek and the alien Neytiri in Cameron’s Avatar.
EARTH’S MIGHTIEST: Having worked with J.J. Abrams on Star Trek and James Cameron on Avatar, I wonder if there’s a way to compare and contrast the two of them as filmmakers.
ZOE SALDANA: It’s like comparing every actor or every writer. People are going to be different. They’re both special for being authentic. J.J. is known and there is an essence to him, and there’s a James Cameron essence. I will say that they did meet and I was sort of their connecting point. It was just amazing, because they’re both very much fans of the other. Jim definitely surprised me. He was shooting one day on the set and he said, “I have a surprise for you,” and there was J.J. and J.J. — you should have seen his face. He was so happy to be there as a filmmaker and a fan of Jim. They were both talking and Jim was pretty much putting in a good word for me, and J.J. was, like, “You don’t have to sell me. I’m already sold on Zoe. I want her for the part [of Uhura]. She doesn’t want to do it.” Jim looked at me and said, “What? You don’t want to do it?” I said, “That’s not what I said,” it was just very funny. I was hesitant of Star Trek for a slight second for the same way that J.J. was hesitant to direct. It was stepping into these big shoes that already existed since before I was born, and there was a real fear of failing the fans.
| Zoe Saldana: ‘James Cameron made little soldiers out of Avatar cast’ | April 21st, 2010 |
Avatar actress Zoe Saldana has said James Cameron ‘made little soldiers out of’ the cast.
Saldana, 31, was referring to director Cameron’s environmental fight to help the real-life natives in the Amazon forest try and protect their land.
She said to Parade.com: ‘It sort of recalls the Navis in Avatar. He’s in Brazil helping natives in the Amazon forest try to stop a major dam project that could destroy their land.
‘Jim just contacted everybody and was like: ‘We need to see if we can go down to Brazil and help some people.’ He wanted us to have his back. He’s a lot more than a legendary filmmaker.
‘He’s a man that feels, that cares a great deal about a lot of things. He can’t just sit down and not do anything. So this is typical Cameron behaviour. He made little soldiers out of us. I am looking at hopping on a plane and going down there and helping him.’
From Monsters and Critics
| Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Zoe Saldana talk about making ‘The Losers’ | April 21st, 2010 |
At the start of production for the new film The Losers, Jeffrey Dean Morgan was more or less the clear star of the film, thanks to his high-profile performances on TV’s Grey’s Anatomy and in Zack Snyder’s Watchmen adaptation. In the last 12 months, however, Zoe Saldana has become a rising star in her own right, appearing not only in J.J. Abrams’ acclaimed reboot of Star Trek, but also playing Neytiri, the soulful heart of the story in James Cameron’s box office-busting Avatar. Appropriately, each of them exudes charisma and charm; but speaking together, Saldana and Morgan offer humble observations and defer to one another when discussing their on-screen collaboration.
Hollywood News spoke to Morgan and Saldana on Sunday at a press conference during the Los Angeles junket for The Losers. In addition to talking about tussling with one another both as actors and physical adversaries (on screen, of course), Saldana and Morgan discussed the chemistry of their characters, and reflected on their respective success in past year – particularly in terms of what it may mean for their futures.
[Note: Although "Hollywood News" is used to distinguish questions from answers in the text below, our journalist was just one of many reporters asking questions of the filmmakers.]
Hollywood News: Zoe, what kind of training did you do in order to own the title ‘bad ass chick’? And do you think that Aisha will get her revenge, or do you think she’ll just get over her issues with Clay, Jeffrey’s character, eventually?
Jeffrey Dean Morgan: I’ll take this question (laughs).
Zoe Saldana: The stunt coordinator that worked on The Losers was the stunt coordinator on Avatar so I’ve known Garrett Warren for 3 or 4 years. He trained me so he’s the one that has beaten me up and knows exactly what my body can do at times when I didn’t even know I could do it myself. By the time we got to Puerto Rico, we basically just changed a couple of things because I had to substitute the bow and the arrow for the guns and the knives and things like that. Throughout the entire summer while we were shooting, I was still training with Garrett, especially because we really wanted to get that fight scene to be amazing. Sylvain [White] wanted it to be violent but he always said to us, “While they’re beating the crap out of each other, they’re also getting to know each other. So, it’s sort of like a conversation, a very violent kind of conversation.” And Jeffrey and I really wanted to capture that. In terms of the conflict resolution, if there is going to be any between Aisha and Clay, I think at some point they’re going to have to have that dance. At least, that’s just me.
Morgan: That’s in the script (laughs).
Saldana: It’s just one but I think it’s going to happen. She starts baking cookies in the comics (laughs).
Hollywood News: Zoe, how much fun was it kicking Jeffrey’s ass, and how fun or challenging was it being the only female in this ensemble?
Morgan: She didn’t kick my ass (laughs). It was even-steven.
Saldana: When you’re the only girl in a cast, I almost feel like you have twice as much work to do because you don’t want to be singled out. You’re already the only girl. So if you’re the one that says “I can’t do this,” or whatever, it’s going to be “Oh my gosh, she’s wimping out because she’s a girl.” So, I toughed it out. I really wanted to impress the guys. I like being around men. I’ve always felt like I can hold my own. Jeffrey was absolutely amazing in the fight scene. There were a couple of moments there where I would have to immediately look at him and say “Oh my god! Did I really hit you hard on your head?” Or he would look at me and say, “Did I slam you really hard?” and I’d just be like “Ugh! Uh huh!” But, it was fun. I liked it.
Hollywood News: Zoe, you tend to play really strong female characters. Have you ever thought of playing someone who’s the complete opposite of this?
Saldana: Like the damsel in distress? Of course. You want to play great characters but right now I feel that Hollywood has made a living out of portraying women to be such cankersores. We just have to be rescued all the time because we’re so incompetent, when in reality sometimes art needs to reflect what’s going on in real life. In today’s society, especially in American society, women are doing so much. I’m from Queens. I’m not from that era where if I was baking cookies, I’d do it. I think that’s great, whatever. But I grew up in Queens in the 80s where women were the caretakers and they were the soldiers. I’m in that phase right now so until I burn that, then I’ll be the damsel in distress. But, right now, I like holding the gun. I like participating in the saving of the day. I think it’s really sexy. It’s kind of like my mom.
| Zoe Saldana Is One Tough Cookie | April 21st, 2010 |
For Zoe Saldana, life has changed a lot since she played a tall, blue alien in the top-grossing film of all time, “Avatar,” but one thing remains constant: she is one tough cookie.
In fact, her stunt coordinator Garrett Warren, who trained her for “Avatar” and upcoming action flick “The Losers,” which kicks its way into theaters on Friday, has remained by the “Star Trek” star’s side in her rise up Hollywood’s A-list.
Before anyone thinks she is all action, no talk, the 31 year-old Saldana also currently stars in film comedy “Death at a Funeral,” and the New Yorker who was raised in the Dominican Republic said family is what is near-and-dear to her heart.
Still, an old-fashioned butt-kicking can do good things for Saldana’s psyche, and she wonders what’s so bad about that.
“I’ve had bruises that would make any man cry, but he and I just find it really sexy,” said Saldana, 31 “Because he’s like, ‘Oh, I love a girl with bruises,’ and “I’m like, ‘I do, too. Is that wrong?’”
On the set of “The Losers,” Saldana earned her fair share of black-and-blue marks as Aisha, a mysterious operative who joins an elite U.S. Special Forces unit that has been betrayed and left for dead in the Bolivian jungle.
| Zoe Saldana Reveals Her Masculine Dreams | April 19th, 2010 |
Hollywood’s hottest actress says there are some male behaviors she is just dying to know about.
Zoe Saldana might be Hollywood’s hottest star after her role in the highest-grossing film of all-time, but it turns out the sexy starlet wants to be reincarnated sans her female assets.
“I would come back as a man,” she told Pop Tarts at the premiere of her latest comedy “Death at a Funeral” in Los Angeles. “I want to know what it is like to take a leak standing up. It blows my mind.”
Saldana also wouldn’t mind being Michael Jackson (during his “Beat It” period) and if she had to be a lady, it would be Cher post-marriage to Sonny Bono.
And when it comes to booze, the New Jersey native learned how to down it hard at a very young age.
“It was the tequila-drinking from my grandmother that we tried to keep from my mom… every Saturday my mom would work late and my sisters and I would take tequila shots like you wouldn’t believe,” Saldana revealed. “We were minors; I can’t even tell you how young I was. It was a very bad day when my mom found out; she was very disappointed in my Grandmother and us.”
And it was the “Avatar” beauty’s grandmother that was often confronted with speculation about Saldana’s sexuality.
“People have sometimes told my grandmother, ‘Your granddaughter has a bit of lesbianism in her,’” Saldana told the new issue of “Siempre Mujer” magazine. “It’s that my sisters and I spent all our time among men. We were very popular with them. Our way of thinking is very masculine.”
But for someone who is certainly no girlie girl, Saldana (surprisingly) doesn’t mind getting glammed up for the Hollywood scene and being considered an ultimate style icon.
“I’m a very simple person and I don’t like to do anyone’s job, I do acting. So I have an amazing stylist who finds things to suit my personality and puts me together, it is so much fun,” she added. “That’s the only time I actually get to feel like a girl and not feel corny.”
From Fox News
The Losers
Death at a Funeral
Takers
Avatar
Star Trek
The Skeptic
