Longoria: I’m desperate to be a housewife

Stone Phillips Anchor • Profile

HOLLYWOOD HILLS, Calif. - Eva Longoria may play a “Desperate Housewife,” but cooking enchiladas in her real-life kitchen, this Mexican-American from deep in the heart of Texas is down home, hands on, and hard to keep up with.

These days, there’s not much time for home. When the 30-year-old actress isn’t heating up the small screen, gracing magazine covers, or posing as the new face of a major cosmetic company, she’s showing up at award shows like MTV’s last August— in a get-up skimpy even by Gabrielle’s standards.

Eva is everywhere. We caught up with her at her home in the Hollywood Hills, a world away from Wisteria lane. 

If “Desperate Housewives” has become America’s primetime guilty pleasure, it’s because of scenes of Longoria’s character, gold-digger Gabrielle Solis, digging her teenaged gardener when her husband’s not around. Though she’s the only “Desperate Housewife” without an Emmy or Golden Globe nomination to her credit, Longoria loves the role, and admits, in her refreshingly candid way, that in some ways she relates.

Eva Longoria: The things we have in common are our ambition and our drive, and we want what we want when we want it. And I think I’ve been like that in my life. We’re very un-similiar in the family ties. She hates children and I want ten. She, you know, married for money—I would never marry for money. She’s materialistic. I’m not.

Stone Phillips, anchor: So how do you feel about the racy scenes? Is it easy for you to do those?

Longoria: No! It’s not easy. It’s highly technical first of all. It’s definitely “Put your arm here, put your head up, tilt it more this way, and if you could kiss her on the right side.” It’s really hard for me and I’ll tell you why: I think kissing is way more intimate than sex. I think kissing someone that you care about is a way more personal gesture. So for me to kiss somebody I’m not in love with is hard.

Phillips: Well, you’re a pretty good actress then, cause you look like you’re enjoying it. 

Longoria:  Ah… although I haven’t been nominated for anything?

Phillips:  Yeah, what’s with that?  You’re the only one who hasn’t been nominated.

Longoria:  I’d like to think that I’m too young. Oh, who knows?

Phillips:  Does it bother you?

Longoria: No, it doesn’t.  I don’t expect it.  When you don’t expect it you can’t be let down.

As unlikely as it seems looking at her today, Longoria says she has always felt like an underdog, dating back to her childhood days in Corpus Christi, Texas, where she grew up the youngest of four sisters in a close-knit Latino family.

Longoria: I grew up as the ugly duckling. They used to call me “La Prieta Faya” which means "the ugly dark one."

Phillips: This is hard to believe.

Longoria: People would literally walk up to my mom when we were little and they would go— “Oh my god, your daughters are so beautiful— and who’s this?” was skin and bones.  I was clumsy.  I was dark.  I was ugly.  So I think growing up, I didn’t depend on looks or the superficiality of being pretty because I wasn’t. I always knew that I’m gonna work have to work hard. Nothing’s gonna be given to me. And I think that comes from my mom and dad.

Her mother, a special education teacher, and her father, a tool engineer at an army depot— took their daughters out on the range at the end of each school week for lessons on how to live off the land.  

Phillips: So you were a country girl on the weekend?

Longoria: Oh my god, through and through, hunting with my dad since I six. I still go with him to this day. 

Phillips: Can you handle a gun?

Longoria: Yeah, I can handle a gun. Hello? Yes. I could skin a deer, I could skin a pig. I can pluck a quail—you name it, I’ve done it.

Phillips: A pioneer woman.

Longoria: A pioneer woman.

And her cooking? Family recipes as well. But there was something else about her family that Longoria says shaped the person she is today— a commitment to care-giving.

Longoria: My older sister Lisa is mentally retarded, intellectually disabled. And so, everything we did, every summer vacation, every trip we took, every holiday— everything was centered around Lisa.  “Can Lisa go?  Is Lisa going to be okay?  Is Lisa going to have fun?” 

Phillips: How do you think that influenced you?

Longoria: I think it definitely molds you into being aware that you have all these opportunities that she doesn’t have and she’ll never have— so you better make the most out of it.

Phillips: Sounds like she’s taught you some things.

Longoria: Oh, she’s taught us all a lot of things. She’s an incredible spirit, an incredible light in our family.

Her sister is not only a source of inspiration, but also of some endearing childhood memories.

Longoria: When we were little, my dad wouldn’t let us eat fast food. And sometimes on a Friday at the end of the month, my mom would get paid. She’d buy us a Domino pizza—

Phillips: Against his wishes?

Longoria: Against his wishes, but we wouldn’t tell him. And so we’d throw away the pizza box in my neighbor’s trash can and every time my dad would come home, Lisa would go “Dad- we had pizza!” I went, “Shhh... we’re not supposed to tell him.”

The spirit of care giving carried over to Longoria’s first career thoughts. In college, she studied to be a sports trainer— caring for athletes. But wrapping ankles would have to wait. After graduating in 1997, she won a local beauty contest and a trip to L.A. to pursue modeling and acting. She decided to give it a shot. And since soap operas had always been a family favorite, that’s where she set her sights.

Longoria: I took soap technique classes, I took soap opera acting classes, I took soap opera makeup classes— I took anything that has to do with a soap. Believe me I could do a movie with Al Pacino and it still won’t be as great to my family as when I had one line on “General Hospital.”

It took her three years to land a regular role, on the “Young and the Restless.” About two years later, she jumped to primetime in “L.A. Dragnet.” When that show was cancelled, she auditioned for producer Marc Cherry, who was casting a satire about the secret lives of suburban housewives.

Longoria: It was my fifth audition of the day. And I was like, “Wait, I didn’t read it.” And they said “Just read the sides of Gabrielle and I read it.”

Phillips: So you hadn’t prepared?

Longoria: No. I didn’t read the script. I didn’t read it. Marc Cherry asks, “So what did you think of the script?” like the whole thing. And I said, “Well I didn’t read the script. I only read my part.” And Marc Cherry goes, “I knew you were Gabrielle at that moment because it was such a Gabrielle thing to say.”

“Desperate Housewives” would wind up making everyone happy: ABC had a breakout hit and Longoria had a role that would rocket her to stardom.  A year later, she’s still getting used to her celebrity status.

Longoria: I went to a photo shoot the other day. There’s all this paparazzi outside and we pull up and I go, “Who’s here?” And they go, “You.”

I go, “No.” I thought there was a big celebrity here. Why are they all scamping about?

Phillips: So it hasn’t sunk in.

Longoria: I do that all the time.

Longoria may forget she’s famous, but she has found that when she talks these days, people listen. 

MORE FROM DATELINE

Dateline Section Front

Mystery of the missing millionaire Armed and victimized: Congo's child soldiers Serbia's mental institutions a relic of the past The devil's business Inside our border's first line of defense Deadly intentions Murder on the mind Death and the millionaire drifter 10 most amazing rescues caught on tape The stripper and the steelworker Dateline Section Front   Add Dateline headlines to your news reader: