What happens when a seemingly innocent dinner party becomes an unexpected exercise in emotional honesty? In Olivia Wilde’s provocative and wickedly funny relationship comedy The Invite (read our full review here), Seth Rogen and Wilde star as Joe and Angela, a married couple whose increasingly fractured relationship is thrown into disarray when they invite their enigmatic neighbours, Hawk (Edward Norton) and Pína (Penélope Cruz), over for dinner. What begins as an awkward evening of social pleasantries gradually unravels into an intimate confrontation with desire, resentment and the uncomfortable truths we often leave unspoken in our relationships.
Already earning considerable acclaim, the film has secured four nominations at the upcoming Gotham Awards, including Best Feature, Best Adapted Screenplay for Rashida Jones and Will McCormack, Outstanding Supporting Performance for Penélope Cruz, and the Gotham Audience Award. It’s a particularly fitting recognition for Cruz, whose wonderfully uninhibited performance as Pína balances sexual confidence and emotional intelligence with an underlying vulnerability that becomes increasingly apparent as the evening spirals out of control.
Speaking with our Peter Gray, Cruz reflected on the personal experiences that informed one of Pína’s most cathartic moments, the private history she imagined for her character, and how working with a renowned psychotherapist helped her explore the complicated relationship between intimacy, honesty and the desire to heal others. As she reveals, sometimes the most unexpected revelations come not from examining someone else’s relationship, but from finally confronting the uncomfortable truths within our own.
I’m very excited to chat about this incredible film and your incredible performance. I wanted to ask first about how much Pina needs this dinner as well, because we spend so much of the film watching your character inadvertently expose the fractures in Joe and Angela’s marriage. I’ve wondered whether this dinner party reveals something to her about her own relationship as well? Did you ever imagine that your character might leave that apartment having learned something about herself that she hadn’t anticipated?
I think so, for sure. Because everything that happens that night is so intense. I imagine that normally when they (Pina and Hawk) do this kind of visit to a house and they propose an orgy, it’s a yes or no. But they don’t get to a point where Pina has to (start) therapy on that other couple and everything gets so intense that it starts to affect them and all the little things they haven’t said to each other. When Edward’s character, Hawk, keeps correcting Pina’s English, but he speaks very little Spanish and makes so many more mistakes than she does in English…she has an explosion that she was probably close to having many, many times in the last few months.
This visit to this house where everything, all the truths, come to the table and she tells him enough of this patronizing behaviour of correcting me in the most inappropriate moments. I love that rage that she has in that moment. It’s something that I have experienced. Not with close people, but sometimes in the work environment. At the beginning, it was much more common to make jokes about accents and to make you feel bad if you didn’t understand something, (and) because I spoke very little English when I started work in America, it was very frustrating not to be able to get everything. I’ve seen all kinds of situations like that. So it was very freeing to be able to do that scene.
I know that Olivia has said that you prepared so much for Pina. I’m wondering, had you created a private history for Pina before we meet her at all?
There are some things, for example, where Pina mentions that she was Hawk’s therapist. He was her patient and they started a relationship. That gives you a lot of information about her being a therapist capable of starting a relationship with a patient. And she had another relationship before that didn’t last a long time. I asked myself little secrets (about her); who was she before she decided to become a therapist? What was she looking to heal in herself? Where is this thing of wanting to help others? Or this thing with that freedom in her sexuality? Where does it all come from?
It was really helpful to spend time with Esther Perel (Belgian psychotherapist), to be able to talk to her, because she’s an incredible therapist that we had on call when we had doubts. I’ve known a lot of great therapists in my life, but she’s a couples therapist who gave us so much thinking outside of the box. Those are the things that Pina tells them at the end. It’s about bringing the right questions.
Well, everything you had at your disposal, it was incredible. It’s such a nuanced performance. It’s so beautiful. It’s so funny. It’s so alive. Thank you so much for taking the time, and congratulations again.
Thank you so much. Nice to meet you.
The Invite is available to rent/own on DVD, Blu-Ray and On Digital. It’s also now available to stream on HBO Max in Australia.
