| BIOGRAPHY
Widely considered to be the first Mexican actress to become
a Hollywood movie star since Dolores Del Rio, Salma Hayek is known
for bringing a fiery presence and striking, dark-eyed beauty to
the screen. A soap star in her native Mexico, Hayek risked her
entire career to come to L.A., where she struggled to be taken
seriously. Her discovery by director Robert Rodriguez, who cast
her in his 1995 film Desperado, gave Hayek her breakthrough, and
she subsequently gained a reputation as one of Hollywood's sexiest
and busiest actresses.
The daughter of a Spanish mother and Lebanese father, Hayek was
born in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, Mexico, on September 2, 1966.
Raised in a devoutly Catholic family, she was sent to a Louisiana
boarding school at the age of 12. After getting into trouble for
terrorizing the nuns, Hayek returned to Mexico, but she was eventually
sent to Houston, Texas, to live with her aunt, where she stayed
until she was 17. She subsequently moved to Mexico City, where
she studied International Relations as a university student, but,
to the chagrin of her family, decided to drop out in order to
pursue a career as an actress. Starting out in local theatre productions,
she eventually moved to television and landed a starring role
in the popular soap opera Teresa. The show's success made Hayek
a celebrity in her native country, but, desiring something more,
she shocked her fans by deciding to quit the show in order to
pursue a career in L.A.
After taking a year to learn English and study acting with Stella
Adler, Hayek got her first break when Allison Anders cast her
in a supporting role in Mi Vida Loca (1993). The role allowed
Hayek to obtain a Screen Actors Guild card, and after doing so,
she continued to audition until she appeared on a Spanish-language
cable access talk show that happened to count director Robert
Rodriguez amongst its viewers. Rodriguez tracked Hayek down and
promptly cast her in Desperado, his bigger-budget 1995 sequel
to El Mariachi. The film, which also starred Antonio Banderas,
succeeded in giving the actress her own plot on the Hollywood
map, and Rodriguez again demonstrated his faith in her when he
cast her in his next project, the vampire extravaganza From Dusk
Till Dawn (1996).
Unfortunately for Hayek, the film, which also starred George
Clooney, failed to do as well as expected, and Hayek's next few
projects were similarly lackluster. The Faculty (1998), a teen
thriller that cast Hayek as a teacher who turns into an alien,
was an exception, and Kevin Smith's Dogma (1999), which featured
her as a celestial muse, was fairly successful with critics and
audiences. Also in 1999, Hayek had a starring role in what was
to be her biggest film to date, Barry Sonnenfeld's Wild Wild West,
which also starred Will Smith and Kevin Kline. Unfortunately for
all involved, the film was a turkey. In 2000, Hayek could be seen
in smaller, edgier ventures, including the independent comedy
Chain of Fools, in which she played a centerfold-turned- cop,
and Mike Figgis' experimental Time Code, which cast her as Jeanne
Tripplehorn's lover. If these films ultimately didn't provide
Hayek with a role that would draw attention to her genuine talent,
this would soon change with the long awaited /biography of tragic
artist Frida Kahlo. With her role as the epnoymous character in
Frida (2002), Hayek disappeared into her subject so convincingly
that not only would she return to the good graces of critics,
but earn an Oscar nomination as well. |
FILMOGRAPHY
• After the Sunset (2004)
• Hotel (2003)
• Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003)
• Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003)
• Death to Smoochy (2002)
• El Coronel No Tiene Quien Le Escriba (2002)
• Frida (2002)
• In the Time of the Butterflies (2001)
• Living It Up: La Grand Vida (2000)
• No One Writes to the Colonel (2000)
• Time Code (2000)
• Traffic (2000)
• Dogma (1999)
• The Velocity of Gary (1999)
• Wild Wild West (1999)
• 54 (1998)
• The Faculty (1998)
• The Velocity of Gary (1998)
• Breaking Up (1997)
• The Hunchback (1997)
• Fled (1996)
• Fools Rush In (1996)
• From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)
• Desperado (1995)
• Four Rooms (1995)
• Callejon De Los Milagros (1994) |
