Salma Hayek shares stressful experience of filming 'Desperado' love scene

Salma Hayek got her breakout role in the 1995 action film Desperado co-starring Antonio Banderas. Written and directed by Robert Rodriquez, the movie had a lovemaking scene between the two leads. Now, Hayek shares how it was traumatic for her to shoot the intimate sequences.

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Salma Hayek details her traumatic experience shooting Desperado love scene

In a recent conversation on Armchair Expert (via The Hollywood Reporter), hosted by Dax Shepard and Monic Padman, Salma Hayek opened up about her struggle with the love scene in Desperado. She was thrilled to land the role and said that there was no mention of an intimate sequence between her character and Antonio Banderas as El Mariachi in the script. It was brought to her attention after production started. The actor stated that director Robert Rodriquez was her “bro” and his then-wife, producer Elizabeth Avellán, was her “best friend,” so she agreed to do the scene on a closed set. It was just the four of them present.

Salma Hayek recalled that when they were going to begin shooting, she started to sob. She kept saying "no" to the other three people and questioned herself by telling them that she is afraid. The actor mentioned that one of the things she was afraid of was her co-star Antonio Banderas. She noted that he was an “absolute gentleman and so nice,” and they are still “super” close friends, but he was very free. It scared Hayek that for him, it was like "nothing". She started crying, and Banderas was like, ‘Oh my God. You’re making me feel terrible.’ And she was so “embarrassed” that she was crying.

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Salma Hayek cleared multiple times that Robert Rodriguez and Antonio Banderas were “amazing” and the director “never put pressure” on her, but the moment was still very traumatic, and she remembers it vividly. She said that she was not letting go of the towel she was wearing before filming the lovemaking scene. The actor mentioned that the team would try to make her laugh. She would take her towel off for two seconds and started crying again. But they somehow got through it. She noted that they did the best with what they could do at the time.

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Salma Hayek's Desperado love scene was done in quick cuts. She asserted that it was the best she could do between the starts and stops. She said, “when you’re not you, then you can do it.” The actor mentioned that she kept thinking of her father and her brother. She thought, ‘Are they going to see it? And are they going to get teased?’ Hayek claimed that guys do not have that kind of concern. Their father will be, ‘Yeah! That’s my son!’ she noted. The Oscar-nominated star stated that she took her father and brother to watch the film, but they left the theatre during the intimate sequence and returned when it was over. “You want your father to be nothing but proud of you,” she noted.

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