Penelope Cruz

Focusing on Cruz's key films and their surrounding discourse, Ann Davies explores how she is called upon to embody different ideas of youthfulness, nationality, exotic otherness, and the mature, established actress.

Part of a vanguard of Spanish talent claiming success at home and in Hollywood, Penélope Cruz is one of the best known European stars today. Focusing on Cruz's key films and their surrounding discourse, Ann Davies explores how she is called upon to embody different ideas of youthfulness, nationality, exotic otherness, and the mature, established actress. Considering the contradictions of Cruz's star persona – between spontaneity and tightly controlled privacy, between hard work and passive beauty, and between Spain and Hollywood itself – this book charts the development of her career and the questions, difficulties and pleasures it inspires.