Maggie Gyllenhaal says Penélope Cruz is one of a “tiny handful of brilliant actors,” and she wanted Cruz to bring both power and vulnerability to Myrna Malloy, the Chicago police detective Cruz plays in Gyllenhaal’s gothic romance The Bride!.
“I think there are many, many good actors, and I think there are a tiny handful of brilliant actors, and I think that Penelope Cruz is one of them,” Gyllenhaal said.
For Gyllenhaal, Cruz’s intelligence and capacity for wild, irrational thinking were also essential to Myrna. The character has to keep her emotions contained to survive in her world, but Gyllenhaal said Cruz lets the audience feel what’s beneath that restraint: “I feel so many deep emotional things happening under the surface all throughout [her] performance.”
Cruz returned the praise, calling Gyllenhaal “an incredible director and writer.” She said: “She did something that is so modern, so rock ‘n’ roll, but still with so many layers, so much depth, so much humour and emotion.”
Jessie Buckley, Christian Bale, Peter Sarsgaard, Annette Bening and Jake Gyllenhaal also have starring roles in The Bride! Its inspiration comes from the 1935 film Bride of Frankenstein, which drew on Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein.
