Between the 8th and 25th of January, Pedro Almodóvar reencountered himself with one of his public pleasures, writing -Paty Diphusa always in the memory-, to again show his talent and and capability of observation of everything that surrounded him. A very funny and logical look at the capitals of the empire with a very personal style, that seducing mixture of Capote and Chus Lampreave. Here is a selection of that diary.

Click here to read the diary in Spanish.

 

8th of January

Madrid Barajas airport. I walk in the main hall exhausted, wearing dark glasses and two huge suitcases, and the hand luggage, present from Louis Vuitton. I walk to the Iberia stand. In the short way, some travelers with unexplainable face of popular party shout at me: "Go get the Oscar!". I dedicate them a stupid smile, I don't have the guts to tell them that the nominations are not made public until the 15th of February, but I don't think they will accept that explanation. The same thing happens again while the whole time I spend at the airport. Even the policeman at the passport check booth tells me, as if he was revealing a secret I was trying to hide but he naturally knows, "going for the Oscar, right?". I smile again a bit apprehensive. Policemen still make me feel weird, you know the Pavlov effect.

9th of January

 [...] When it's the turn of John Waters, the guests laugh a lot with the presentation he makes of my trajectory. The king of trash defends the rest of my filmography and says that my characters are the type of people he would like to invite for dinner. "As a creator of feminine characters, Almodóvar makes George Cukor look like Otto Preminger". This is one of the sentences that gets most laughs.

11th of January

We're traveling to Los Angeles.

In the hotel hall, Gus van Sant has breakfast with two guys. I stop to talk to them until Michel arrives. [...]

To fight my jet lag we ring Penélope Cruz's room immediately, who also stays in the Sunset. She will stay three months, until she finishes the dubbing of Blow, a film directed by Ted Demme (Beautiful Girls) and with her and Johnny Depp as the main cast. Penélope has plans with some friends and she invites us to go with her, they are going bowling.

Penélope's friends are her old work colleagues. The director and actor Billy Bob Thornton, with whom she has filmed All the Pretty Horses. Matt Damon, protagonist of the film and presently nominated for the best actor Golden Globe award for The Talented Mr. Ripley, of Minghella. Matt is accompanied by his girlfriend, Winona Ryder. We relax in no time. We're all pleased to share bowling and Penélope. Winona has a beautiful face, a white privileged skin for monopolizing the light, perfect eyes and nose and live and perfect lips. Fat arm. (!) I'm surprised, in cinema you don't get fat arms. [...]

14th of January

We travel to Palm Springs in limousine, the four of us. they put me and Penélope in some suites (I don't recall the name of the area) and Tinín and Michel in a hotel opposite the street. The first thing they tell them is that they are non-smoking rooms (the smoking ones do not exist anymore), and they make them sign a paper where they promise not to smoke, and if they discover otherwise they will get fined 300 dollars (about 45.000 pesetas) for the cleaning of the room.

We all hallucinate when they tell us. Since the topic is out, Penélope tells us that she has had to sign, in her contract as an actress, a clause where she promises not sexually harass anybody in the places of filming. In this country there is such paranoia with the lawsuits that the studio fears somebody will sue them. We hallucinate again.

18th of January

Before I sit at my table I hug John Turturro, adorable as always; he shares a table with his colleagues Susan Sarandon y Tim Robbins. [...] I just saw Anthony Minghella. I throw myself to his arms, he is exactly half as tall as Tim Robbins and is fatter than me. [...]

Pollack introduces me the interesting Kevin Spacey, without award tonight but with so morbid you could shit yourself. We tell each other the two protocol sentences: "I love your work and I'd love to work with you".  

22nd of January

I will attend (even if I don't feel like it) to the party organised by Phoenix Pictures, a traditional pre-globe party.

There is loads of people, more executives than stars, but the most impressive thing is the house. It belongs to one of the Phoenix Pictures associates.

The house, the correct thing would be to call it a palace or big villa, is a copy of a Fiorentine mansion, or is it Florentine?, made to order by the first proprietor, the actor Harold Lloyd. We bump again to Kevin Spacey and Cloë Sevigny. Michael Nyman, Jon Bon Jovi and Michel York are also there. [...]

Even the situation is rich in future conversation topics and in food, I want to go to bed early. The owner of the house asks me to wait, the president will turn up in a few minutes, "and then you can meet him". I ask the president of what company, He looks at me like I'm joking. The president of the United States, Clinton. He says. [...]

Finally, a great commotion of big men, whispering, guests piling up, and there he is. He is tall and pink, I can't say anything else. I don't know if he's ashamed of himself or if pink is his natural skin colour. the host looks for me with his eyes, I go to him in the company of Penélope. They introduce us, I don't know he caught my name, I tell him: "My name is Pedro Almodóvar and I make films of one hour and a half". I introduce him to Penélope. They shake hands. She does not say anything.

Our experience with the president can be summarised with these few seconds. He then goes into the room surrounded by a human crowd.

once back in our limousine-uterus, back to the hotel, I reflex: why the presence of presidents leaves you an acre flavour of clear dissatisfaction in your mouth?

My brother insists: just like in Bienvenido Mr. Marshall.

23rd of January

The doctor rings asking for my health. I tell him that I don't know how I feel, I only know it is G. G. day and I will not miss the date. [...] Everybody was there, and pretty-pretty ladies (not counting Penélope, Halle Barry and Winona's face) only three: Julia Roberts. ¡what a face! It looked like her features were going to come out of her face. Cameron Díaz is like a beautiful cat. To eat her alive, which is what her new boyfriend is doing, a young actor who stars in Winona Ryder's movie and was doing everything possible for people to look at him. Two tables behind was Michelle Pfeiffer, wearing reading glasses. A beauty [...]

I remember the face the guests had when they saw me climb up the stage and heard the speech, laughing to death or not believing it. Part of the guests, at least the people closest to the stage, were: Robert de Niro, W. Beatty, Annette Benning, Courtney Love, Meryl Streep, Jim Carrey, Harrison Ford, Liz Hurley, Hugh Grant, Jodie Foster, Sigourney Weaver, Alec Baldwin, Sarah Jessica Parker, Angelina Jolie, Gwyneth Paltrow, Michael J. Fox, Ben Affleck, Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman's sister, Billy Cristal, Julianne Moore, Matt Damon, Winona Ryder, Antonio Banderas, Melanie Griffith, Sidney Pollack, Sam Mendes, Minghella, Jack Lemmon, Shirley McLaine, Spielberg... and the whole cast of the series The Sopranos, the tv series of the decade with James Gandolfini at front.

I did not expect it, when they said: Spain. All About My Mother I got such a flash I lost control, and I turned (or at least I tried) my lack of control in a show.

 

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