Penelope Cruz lived a childhood in a typical family of the Spanish middle class.
Penelope Cruz did not have abundance, but she did not lack anything in the first years of her life either. She went through that stage between friends, sports, and rigorous attendance at school. However, as a teenager, Penélope Cruz felt that her place in her world was going to be in acting. Before that, she had not even imagined it, but her dream appeared to her in 1989 after seeing Tie Me Up.
Curiously, Penelope was 13 years old when the Pedro Almodóvar film was shown in theaters: she was not allowed in. But she managed to falsify her ID to gain her entry and get into the front rows. Already grown up and with fame on her shoulders, she commented that she had done it so as not to miss the premiere of her favorite director's film.
Until then, her flirtation with her art was linked to dance. Classical dance ran through her veins, but she was overshadowed when she set the goal of not only succeeding in the seventh art but also working with Almodóvar. With these two fixed ideas in her mind, she began to study acting and present herself as soon as she found out about casting.
A year later she would star in a video clip for Mecano, the fashionable Spanish band at the time. Almost on par, she was given her first chance to debut on the big screen. It was in The Greek Labyrinth, a film in which she had a small participation. Once inside the industry, she went for more. That young woman who was born in Alcobendas, a municipality in Madrid, she was beginning to give life to that dream of hers.
Popularity and trauma
In 1992, at the age of 17, she came across a great chance, but nothing turned out as she imagined and she was even on the verge of abandoning the career that she loomed as promising. Bigas Luna summoned her for the Spanish film Jamón jamón. It was her first leading role and an initial flirtation with the awards that would come after her, thanks to her work. For the film, she was nominated at the Goya Awards in the leading actress category.
Cruz was just a teenager and she had to face several scenes. The endless filming, episodes that she had to repeat over and over again while she was N- in front of a whole team, caused her, like other actresses, great trauma. She went from joy to disappointment in the blink of an eye. What she wanted for her life had not started off in the best way.
To top it all off, she was met with stark criticism when the work came out: her explicit scenes threatened to pigeonhole her. The press at that time wondered how her career would continue since films of this nature were not abundant. There was even no shortage of voices that recommended, almost maliciously, that she go to adult cinema. Penelope got tired… Was that what she was going to expect for the rest of her career? Would her entire artistic life be linked to that role? Too many questions and - not having so many weapons, being inexperienced - few answers.
Many years later, already consecrated, she would talk about the subject in an interview with the British newspaper The Sun. A query when passing over her first leading role opened an unexpected door. There, she confessed that her acting future hung by a thread, that she was about to slam the door and leave everything.
After hearing the question, she took a breath and released: "I didn't take it well at all. It caused me a strong rejection of anything that had anything to do with the sensual. I cut my hair short and did not do any love scenes, not even with kisses, for several years. I had a very bad time, I wanted to give up everything, my illusion of succeeding as an actress had gone to the floor”.
It was at that moment, in which she was about to kick the board, that her mother, Encarna Sánchez, appeared to support her and prop her up so that she could continue with her desire. “Thanks to her I have always enjoyed being a woman and have appreciated how wonderful we are. She supported me at all times. When she was a girl and said that she wanted to be an actress, she was the only one who supported me, when everyone looked at me as if she had said that she wanted to go to the moon.
After each day of recording, she returned to her house crying. And there was her mother with the right word from her, to calm her down, and dry her tears. Thanks to that she was able to finish filming. Having given up at that moment, in her first leading role and at only 17 years old, surely it would have been an impossible obstacle to overcome.
In the film, she had several scenes with Javier Bardem that marked her forever. Although she admitted that the actor was present to her at all times, taking care of her, nothing about her took away that suffering that paralyzed her. After a period, she understood that step as an apprenticeship. "Over time I have realized that Bigas Luna gave me a great opportunity and I am very grateful for it."
