Salma Hayek: It’s a humbling experience to play a superhero in 50s

Salma Hayek discusses her role Ajak in Marvel Cinematic Universe’s multi-starrer Eternals

Hollywood star Salma Hayek says she is someone who “dreams big” and was surprised to finally get to do Eternals, which fulfils her wish of playing a superhero in a movie with a director like Chloe Zhao. The upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe movie revolves around the Eternals, an alien race living on Earth for over 7,000 years, who team up to protect humanity from their evil counterparts, the Deviants.

Hayek said she doesn’t look like a traditional superhero the audiences are used to watching on screen. She plays Ajak, the wise and spiritual leader at the heart of the story, who has the ability to heal and is the “bridge” between the Eternals and their creators called the Celestials. “It’s a humbling experience because I dream big. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have gotten here. I wanted to be a superhero, and work with the best directors in the world and have big blockbuster movies [that are also] art,” Hayek said in a virtual press conference for the film from Los Angeles.

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“And it didn’t happen that much for me. So, you fight for it in your 20s, 30s and 40s. I would have been great in the art films and in superhero [films, but] they didn’t see it,” the Mexican-American star, 55, quipped. Hayek said she had given up on playing a superhero and then Eternals came her way. “Now, it is humbling when in the middle of your 50s, a brilliant director gives you the opportunity. I was wrong.

Everything is possible. And it’s a humbling sensation,” she added. The Frida star said she “almost cried” at the film’s première when she spotted three little girls of a Latino family dressed as her character.  The gender of Ajak, the character played by Hayek, was swapped from a man to a woman as Zhao said both she and Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige wanted a “mother figure” as the leader of the Eternals.

“And when you think about it, you know, in your 50s, [I’m] Mexican. I mean I’m short with big boobs, it’s not the normal superhero... I don’t have botox,” she said, eliciting a resounding laugh from the rest of the cast. The actor said the team even let her do her own stunts in the movie. When little girls around the world will see her play Ajak on screen, Hayek said they will remember “that everything is possible”. The ensemble cast of Eternals also includes Kit Harington, Kumail Nanjiani, and Angelina Jolie.

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