Salma Hayek Pinault's Success, the Film "Without Blood" and Kering Foundation Projects
The actress and producer of Mexican origins talks about her role in “Without Blood” and the deep bond that ties her to Angelina Jolie, the film’s director. Her commitment to Latino inclusion in cinema and the fight against violence against women.
Text by Carrie Wittmer
Charlie Gray Photography
Styling Gaia Fraschini
“You’re so confidently insecure.” Salma Hayek Pinault told me that Channing Tatum, her “Magic Mike Last Dance” costar, once made that very accurate observation about her. And she remembers it with a laugh. Since she entered Hollywood in the 1990s, after working on a string of telenovelas in Mexico, Hayek Pinault, 58, has projected an intoxicating, inspiring confidence. But beneath that confidence lurks insecurity.
Despite decades of success, including roles as the vampire queen in “From Dusk Till Dawn,” an Oscar nomination for “ Frida ,” a starring role in the romantic comedy “Fools Rush In” opposite Matthew Perry (one of her favorites), and a guest-starring role in the Emmy-winning “ 30 Rock ,” Hayek Pinault has worked hard her entire professional life. The Mexican actress has fought for inclusivity, championing Spanish-speaking actors and shows. She was a producer on the American adaptation of “Ugly Betty” (she had “no doubt” it would be a hit, but still faced pressure) and has her own production company, Ventanarosa.
Her latest project, a TV adaptation of Laura Esquivel’s popular 1989 novel “Water for Chocolate,” will be released on Max on November 3. The story is set during the Mexican Revolution, and follows a couple in love who can’t be together because of family traditions and obstacles. “One of the challenges was adapting it to a time when those traditions no longer exist,” the actress says. “There’s an interest in the many ways women have been wronged throughout history.” The more we talk with her, the more Tatum’s observation makes sense. While she’s seen some improvement, it’s still difficult to land projects centered on Mexican or Spanish-speaking characters. Like “Water for Chocolate,” for example, which has been in the works for six years. “I tried to explain to the industry that they were missing out on a very important market that deserves to be represented, since it’s so present. There are 600 million Spanish-speaking people in the world, and there are some Latinos who don't even speak Spanish but come from a Hispanic background, and they weren't taken into consideration," explains the actress.
With Ventanarosa, the production company she founded with Jose Tamez in 1999, Hayek Pinault looks for “little gems” that have a strong Latin identity, that come from Latin culture, but are ultimately universal. “We only make projects that we think are for all human beings, and the originality comes from the richness of that culture, but many other cultures are similar and will identify with it. We try to make original projects that are for everyone. We don’t try to isolate the audience and say, ‘Oh, this is so intellectual.’ But we also don’t make cheap and overly commercial projects. We always look for originality and universality at the same time.”
Originality is key to Hayek Pinault, even if it’s become increasingly difficult to sell in this age of Hollywood’s obsession with intellectual property, remakes, reboots and more. “Every time you bring out originality, they fight you ,” she says. “Even if it’s not a Latin project, every time you try to offer originality, everyone panics.” She attributes her success to never giving up, calling “Water for Chocolate” a “miracle. You can’t imagine all the things I had to do to get it on the air,” she says. This fall, she’ll be seen as Nina in “Without Blood,” directed by Angelina Jolie , which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in September.
The film, based on Alessandro Baricco’s short novel of the same name, focuses on the individual trauma of the brutality of war. Nina has firsthand experience, having witnessed her father’s execution at a young age, and grapples with her own trauma throughout the film. Despite the challenging themes and material (“a lot of monologues”), Hayek Pinault describes it as one of the easiest jobs she’s ever done. “It was the easiest role I’ve ever had, I was just memorizing the lines automatically and effortlessly. It was so strange. The first day after I got home I had a breakdown because I had been holding those emotions in for so long.” For the role, Jolie encouraged Hayek Pinault to hold in her emotions rather than let them go. This pleasant — or, given the material, as pleasant as possible — experience in such an emotionally challenging film is a credit to Jolie, whom she recalls meeting briefly years ago, as one does at industry events.
But the two didn’t really get to know each other until they were filming “Eternals,” a 2021 Marvel movie that featured them alongside “a huge group of people” (including Richard Madden, Gemma Chan, Kumail Nanjiani, Kit Harington, Barry Keoghan, and Harry Styles). When Hayek Pinault talks about Jolie, his voice lights up, emotional but calm. “We slowly and very authentically started to see each other, not like other people see us, like we were in sync or something,” he says. After the film wrapped, they continued their friendship. “It’s very real,” he says, and it’s not something he talks about often or shows off on his Instagram feed. It’s something special. What he seems to admire most about Jolie is her fearlessness, and her unafraid to be brutally honest, which she describes as well. He calls her a “generous” director and uses the word “delightful” several times to describe the experience of working on set. They are both devoted mothers, she has a son with her husband, French businessman François-Henri Pinault, and is a stepmother to his three children. The couple, who married in 2009, have a family code of sorts: they don’t spend more than two weeks away from their family at a time (with some exceptions), which can be a “nightmare” for scheduling and participating in projects.
«Some time ago, in Mexico , they told me that I could no longer speak Spanish , that I had forgotten my language. mother . Meanwhile, in America, they were saying to me: “Can you get rid of the accent ?” Salma Hayek Pinault
Jolie has adjusted, without a problem. Hayek Pinault speaks out about Jolie’s treatment by the press. “I’ve never met a more misunderstood person,” she says. “I hear things that are so far from reality. It’s been quite shocking to witness all of this.” She, too, has experienced deceit “many, many times.” Too many to count . “A while ago, in Mexico, they told me that I couldn’t speak Spanish anymore, that I had forgotten my mother tongue. Meanwhile, in America, they said to me: ‘Can you get rid of the accent?’” Even before she became a public figure, Hayek Pinault devoted much of her time to charity work, particularly supporting victims of domestic violence. “It’s very difficult for us, we don’t feel safe as women,” she says. Her involvement in this work has “always been automatic,” something that came naturally to her. She and Pinault now sit on the board of the Kering Foundation , whose mission is to “eradicate gender-based violence.” In September, the foundation hosted a gala dinner in New York, Caring for Women, attended by Kim Kardashian, Dakota Johnson, and Julianne Moore. For Hayek Pinault, it’s important that “95 percent” of this work isn’t done in front of the cameras. “I’m very strategic,” she says. “ I give myself an infrastructure to do it. You don’t see me talking about this on Instagram.” Instead, her Instagram is a place of pure joy: bikini shots, Paris Fashion Week moments (like a video of her with Harry Styles at the Valentino show), and behind-the-scenes photos from other events. There’s one question that has always bothered her and that she gets asked a lot about her charity work.
She is asked if she has ever personally experienced domestic violence, which she has not. When she says so, they ask why she is involved. “If you only work for the things that are good for you, are you really working?” She has always been outspoken and candid about the treatment of women in and outside of the entertainment industry, and about her experience as a woman of color in the entertainment industry, which has always inspired her to support others like her, including her best friend, Penélope Cruz, who she took in when she first came to Hollywood.
In 2006, they starred in “Bandidas,” and Hayek Pinault told me he wants to work with her again before he dies. And she thought back to her outspoken nature. “Afterwards, I say, ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’ But now I’m not so outspoken because now everyone is too outspoken,” she says . “Everyone has become so black and white, so I keep my mouth shut. I find conversations that have nothing to do with real problems and instead have to do with the desperation of seeking attention boring. A lot of people don’t care about the problems as much as they care about being right. It becomes about themselves. I’ve been doing this job so long that my opinion won’t change anything.”
Her fight for Latino inclusion in the industry has paid off. “Ugly Betty” was a network hit that certainly sparked debate, and since then, other Latino-centric films and series have been made, including “ Jane the Virgin,” “Roma,” and “Coco.” When I ask her what she is insecure about, she doesn’t give me a specific answer. But her success and influence could be one of the many things she feels insecure about, an all-too-common trait in women.
“I have moments where I’m super insecure about something, and then I bounce back to a safe place. I love my insecurity. I don’t let it affect me or take over me. That’s the secret. If I wasn’t insecure, I’d be arrogant and I’d never learn. Embracing your insecurities is part of being confident. A lot of our insecurities come from a collective idea of putting women down. Over time, you can stop feeling guilty for wondering if maybe you’re amazing.” In her free time, she watches “a lot of bad stuff because that’s the only way to relax. Good stuff is work for me.” If she watches something good, her brain becomes overactive—a producer’s brain, so to speak. “I’m finding some comfort in mediocrity. I’m making mediocrity work for me.”
HAIR: Mariana Padilla
MAKE UP: Angloma using WESTMAN ATELIER
MANICURE: Jessica Malige
PRODUCER: Joshua Glasgow
SEAMSTRESS: Alizée Tilagone Le Borgne
PHOTO ASSISTANTS: Garth McKee, Lautaro Ceglia
STYLING ASSISTANT: Nadia Gil
