I’d love to play a Brit… I do a great Victoria Beckham impression, says Eva Longoria as she reveals her perfect role
HOLLYWOOD superstar Eva Longoria and Victoria Beckham bonded over their shared love of fashion and cheeky sense of humour.
But now the pair have got so close that the Desperate Housewives actress has perfected a convincing impression of Posh.
Eva, 48, said: “I wish I could play an English person. I do a great Victoria impression, so that’s about as far as it goes.”
And she already has the perfect role in mind — an honorary sixth member of the Spice Girls in a sequel to their 1997 film.
Eva said with a giggle: “One of my favourite movies is Spice World. So there you go — here comes Spice World 2. I’m Spicy Spice.”
And just like her pal Victoria, 49, the brunette beauty works out daily, getting up at 5am to exercise for an hour before her hectic day begins.
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In an exclusive interview, Eva said: “I work out for sanity, not vanity. It’s my mental health hour — it’s something I have to do. That gives me a lot of clarity.
“I remember I said, ‘OK, I have a meeting at 7am’, and they go, ‘Oh, so you’re not going to work out tomorrow’.
“And I said, ‘No, no, that means I have to work out at five’. And they were like, ‘Why don’t you just sleep?’ And I was like, ‘Because it really gets rid of the brain fog.’
“So for me that’s important. My morning routine is sacred.”
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Eva admits she is a “creature of habit”, adding: “I wake up very early. I’m a morning bird. The new thing I’m doing, based on research, is receiving the first sun.
“When the sun comes out, it sets your biorhythms so you end up sleeping better.
‘I think she’s the one’
“I’ve been absorbing the sun, meditating for about ten minutes and then I work out. That’s been consistent for the last year, and it’s really changed my life.”
Eva first burst on to our TV screens in 2004, playing sexy maneater Gabrielle Solis in Desperate Housewives.
But the Mexican-American actress had failed so many auditions before bagging the role that she never anticipated the fame that followed.
She recalled: “When I read Desperate Housewives, it was like the ninth audition I had that day and I was exhausted.
“I was changing in my car, driving from being a nurse and then a sex worker . . . it was my last audition of the day.
“I remember going in and the creator Mark Cherry goes, ‘What did you think of the script?’ And I said, ‘Look, I didn’t read it. I read my part and my part’s amazing.’
“He said he knew I was Gaby Solis in that moment because it was the most selfish thing I could have said.
“He was like, ‘It can’t be this easy. I think she’s the one’.”
But Eva doesn’t believe the show about four neighbours on Wisteria Lane struggling with suburban life would be the same 20 years on.
She admitted: “I don’t think we could do the show today. There’s things I said and did that I don’t think I could say and do now. But that was a different time and era.”
The actress, who has directed her first feature film, Flamin’ Hot, recalled: “I used Desperate House- wives as my film school. I would load the camera with film and I was always on set, even if it wasn’t my shot. They would let me operate the camera. It was like my playground.
“I was constantly curious. I would just keep asking questions. I enjoyed every minute of being on set.
“But when I was acting, I felt like I wasn’t reaching my full potential as a human being. I’d go to work, I’d stand on a mark, I’d say my lines and I’d go home.
“I don’t edit it, I don’t cast it, I don’t put the music over it, I don’t market it, I don’t have a say in anything. And that really bothered me, because I really wanted to control the final product and also create the opportunities that I wanted not only for myself, but for my community and for women.”
Eva was stunned by the success of Desperate House- wives, which ran for eight years.
The multi-award-winning comedy drama catapulted Teri Hatcher, Felicity Huffman, Marcia Cross and Eva to worldwide stardom.
Eva said: “I don’t think any one of us was the magic. I never thought my individuality had anything to do with it.”
“I really felt like this global phenomenon of these women and Wisteria Lane was the magic.”
She said of the award bashes she ended up at: “That first year, I didn’t even know what a Golden Globe was.
"I was such a baby to know how to navigate that world. You need a whole machine behind you for it.
“I thought we would just show up and wear pretty dresses.”
Eva, who is married to Mexican businessman Jose Baston, 55, and has a four-year-old son Santiago, has not shied away from hot political issues.
She is proud of her campaigning work on and women’s education through the Eva Longoria Foundation.
Eva said: “Ever since my son was born I have felt such an urgency to fix the world.
“I have anxiety about the environment, gun control, politics, about the divisiveness of politics. I’m definitely way more involved. My philanthropic work and helping women reach their full potential through educational programmes or entrepreneurial programmes is really my life’s work.
“If you look at the pie chart of my time and my day, most of it is probably dedicated to my foundation.”
Eva, whose parents are Mexican, added: “Latinos are still under-represented in front of the camera, we’re still under-represented behind the camera, we’re still not tapping into the females of the Latino community.
“The illusion is like, ‘Oh, there’s so much change’.
“But the notion that Hollywood is so progressive is a myth when you look at the data.
“It’s so interesting, because we’re the fastest-growing demographic in the United States.
“We have trillions of dollars of buying power. Your film will not succeed if you do not have the Latino audience.”
Eva’s directorial debut is about to be released.
But during her visit to Britain, she feared that audiences here would not appreciate her new film Flamin’ Hot, which tells the story of real-life Latino snack inventor Richard Montanez.
She went on: “The reception has been great but it’s such an American story — there’s no Flamin’ Hot Cheetos in the UK — that I wonder if it will resonate in the UK.
“But the Flamin’ Hot is not the point of the story. Thematically I wanted to explore what happens when opportunity is not distributed equally.
“It’s exciting, because it’s another success story in corporate America.
“I think the reason they hired me was for authenticity. The story is a Mexican-American story. I am Mexican-American. My north star was authenticity in all departments — production design and costume design and props, in cinematography.”
And she fought off stiff competition for the chance to direct the rags-to-riches story.
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She said: “I knew I was gonna have to work twice as hard and out-hustle everybody.”
- Flamin’ Hot will be streaming on Disney+ and Hulu from Friday
