Penélope Cruz lives a great moment. She is one of the most recognized actresses on the national and international scene. She does not lack work, but she can make it compatible with the care of her children, aged 9 and 11, and as if that were not enough, she has been awarded the National Film Award, which the Minister of Culture, Miquel Iceta, presented to her this afternoon. within the framework of the San Sebastian Festival.
The actress has wanted to reciprocate all that generosity that life has given her by donating the 30,000 euros of the prize for social purposes. Cruz will deliver three lots of 10,000 euros each to the Platform for People Affected by Mortgages, to the Cris cancer unit for advanced therapies at Hospital La Paz in Madrid, and to the assistance fund created by her mother-in-law, Pilar Bardem, in Aisge to give shelter to film professionals who “are having difficulties”.
“The adventure of this long journey to Ithaca is proving to be much more exciting than I could have ever dreamed of from the living room of my parents’ house,” said an emotional Penelope after receiving the Award in a speech in which she also recalled to the directors who made her the most international Spanish actress such as Bigas Luna or Fernando Trueba and, above all, Pedro Almodóvar: “the director with whom I have worked the most times and with whom I hope to work many more and one of the people who our country has best narrated, an essential figure to understand cinema in general”.
The actress, who dedicated the award to her husband and her family, also highlighted the work of the San Sebastian Festival and its director, José Luis Rebordinos, who “has been fighting for good cinema for decades”. Taking advantage of the presence of the Minister of Culture, Cruz asked that the institutions “never stop protecting and caring for our cinema because it is a sign of our identity and an important part of what makes us recognize and understand each other”.
