Jessica Alba – Before she became a gazillionaire

December 30, 2019 71 Comments

                               June 2005  By Philip Berk

Shortly after she was chosen by James Cameron to play the lead in his TV series Dark Angel, I asked Jessica Alba — she was a teenager at the time — Weren’t you nervous about meeting the Titanic director? 

“I was?”  was her snooty reply.

But she had an explanation.

“Before that audition, I hadn’t worked for eight months. By choice,” she emphasizes. “I didn’t need to. I wasn’t paying bills. I didn’t have anything I needed to support. I felt I would only work if I really loved it, which is why I do it. I don’t do it for the money. I do it just for me.”

So who pay the bills? I wondered.

“I do. I’ve been working since I was ten, and I’ve saved my money.”

Does she still live with her parents?

“I live by myself. I’m eighteen. I graduated high school when I was seventeen, and that’s when I moved out of my house. My parents didn’t think I could do it. They were scared. My mom would call me, ‘Do you need me to come over, how’s your laundry?’ I’m like, ‘It’s good, it’s fine.’ ‘Are you feeding yourself?’ And I’m like, ‘I can go grocery shopping, mom.’ And she’s, ‘You should call me sometimes.”

She sounds like a typical Latino mother, but she isn’t.

“My mom’s family is from Denmark and Montreal. She’s French Canadian and Danish. My father is from Mexico. I’m proud of both heritages, but I’m all mixed up; so I tend to play sort of nondescript characters, although I definitely can’t play the Waspy white girl which sometimes breaks my heart.”

At the time she was rumored to be involved with her Dark Angel costar Michael Weatherly.

Asked about it, she refused to talk about him or anyone else.

“Who I’m involved with I don’t really like to talk about. It’s a personal thing. I like to keep it mine. I just don’t like to talk about it.”

A year later, after she had been nominated for a Golden Globe, she was officially engaged to Weatherly.

How has the working relationship changed? I asked her then.

And  she was prepared to talk about him.

“We’ve only worked three days since the announcement, but I don’t think it changes anything. Our engagement is a completely personal thing. The chemistry we have is what we’ve always had.”

But then unexpectedly she added, “I’m just the luckiest girl in the world to be able to be up there with my boy.”

When did they first discover you were in love?

“With anybody it just kind of happens. I’d rather not go into the details. It means a lot to me, and I’d rather keep it to myself.”

Isn’t she rather young to be thinking of marriage?

“Not really because my parents got married when they were eighteen and nineteen, and they had me and my brother at nineteen and twenty. They’ve been together ever since, and my grandparents, the same thing. My grandmother was twenty, and my grandfather twenty-three. My father has four siblings, and only one has gotten a divorce. We really believe in family and loyalty and the old Catholic idea that you stick it out through through thick and thin.”

Don’t some of her friends try to discourage her?

“Some think it’s great; some think it’s a bad idea. But it’s a my choice.”

Does she get along well with her brother?

“I have a very good relationship with my brother. When we were little kids, he knocked out four or six of my teeth. He pushed me off beds; he hit me in the face with plastic boats. We’d go at each other because we’re only a year and three months apart. But then when he got old enough to drive, he became real nice because I had a car. So all of a sudden I was his best friend, and he would make up my bed in the morning. We’ve gotten along real well since he turned sixteen. We’ve been really close. If he needs advice about girls or school or what he wants to do, he usually comes to me.”

Three years later they’re still close, but sad to say she and Weatherly are no longer together. They broke off their engagement in 2003.

Since then, she’s dated Wilmer Valderamma and Mark Wahlberg among others.

At her press conference (in Las Vegas for The Fantastic Four) relationships are the least thing on her mind.

She’d much rather talk about the three movies she has coming out this summer, the first of which Sin City (banned in Malaysia) casts her in a completely different role as an exotic dancer.

In the movie she’s a blonde,

And at the press conference she’s blonde.

Wasn’t she always a brunette? I ask her.

“My hair is naturally dark, although not as black as it was in Dark Angel. But I wanted to look like my mom and explore the other side of me. My mom has strawberry blonde hair, and she never felt I looked like her, but now that I’ve dyed my hair, she thinks I do. At first I thought it would be a change, but now I have three movies in a row in which I play a blonde so it’s been good.”

The other two are Into the Blue with Paul Walker and The Fantastic Four, in which she plays one of the title characters.

Did she need a coach for the exotic dancing in Sin City?

“I had done Honey where I played a choreographer and actually trained three months for that.  So I thought great, I’ll get a choreographer to teach me stripping, but Robert was like, ‘No, Nancy has her own thing. You just feel it.’ So I went to strip clubs and watched how the girls do it. I found that nobody has a schtick. In the book Frank made her very glamorous. She has chaps, she has pistols, she has a rope. It’s a lot more glamorous than it is in the strip clubs. So I  used my imagination. I stole some music from the strip clubs,  but that was all.’

How embarrassing was it for her, Jessica Alba, movie star,  to walk into a sleazy strip bar?

“Sleazy, I don’t know. I think strip clubs have a place in society. There’s definitely a market for them. It’s as sleazy as Vegas, I guess. The only thing that made me uncomfortable was when the girls wanted to give me lap dances,  and I was like, ‘I don’t want that.  I just want to talk to you.’ I would sit them down, give them a hundred bucks, and ask them how they became strippers. ‘How do you dance on stage naked? How the hell do you do that?’ ‘What if you fall?’ They wear high heels and sometimes they would fall. ‘You pretend that nobody is there,’ they told me, but then they would ask me, ‘You want your lap dance now?’ And I was like,’No, here’s another hundred  bucks not to do that. That really made me nervous.”

What can she say about the other two movies?

“That it was nice being employed for a full year. I was in the Bahamas at the beginning of 2004 for Into the Blue playing a shark wrangler. I did that because I wanted to scuba dive in the Bahamas for five months. How could I not want to.”

Does she play a desperate character in that as well?

“Not at all. I play a really innocent, sweet, smart girl unlike anyone I’ve played before. There’s nothing street or urban about her. She’s this hippie who lives in the Bahamas and is in love with her boy friend. After that, Sin City came along which was also a departure for me. Nancy is so hopeful and naive. She just believes in soul mates and love. I think the blond hair helped. And then I was got Fantastic Four, and the chance to play Susan Storm who is my favorite heroine. She’s the one who keeps the boys together. She’s the only woman in this team of super heroes. She’s very respectable, very maternal, very intelligent, but has a problem expressing her emotions because she’s a woman in a man’s world. I couldn’t wait to play her scenes where I had to hold in my emotions.”

Getting back to relationships, I ask her, Having once been burned, would she get involved with a co-star again?

“I don’t think you can generalize. Relationships are purely about whether you are compatible or not. They have nothing to do with the work place. (Sin City director) Robert Rodriguez and his wife work together. She runs his production company, she runs the show. He wouldn’t have the creative freedom to do everything he does if he didn’t have the structure she provides him. She keeps him grounded and organized. It’s a great relationship that’s completely professional .”

But if she were to meet someone on a set, would she get involved?

“I’d be okay with it, but I’m not looking to move from my current position.”

Which is?

“I have a beautiful man in my life. His name is Cash, and he’s wonderful.”

Did they meet on a set?

“No, he’s not a actor.”

(His full name is Cash Warren and he happens to be the son of actor Michael Warren, a regular on TV’s St. Elsewhere’s)

Is she still close to her family?

“They were out with me last night; they’re probably better partygoers than I am. I’m more of a homebody. They like to have a good time, and they’re very cool.”

What has she learned from them?

“They believe in marriage. That was a big lesson. You stick with it through good times and bad.”

And for herself?

“I think it’s beautiful. It’s a big commitment, and if you believe in it, which I do, there’s nothing better.”

71 thoughts on “Jessica Alba – Before she became a gazillionaire”

  3. Its like you read my mind! You appear to know a lot about this, like you wrote the book in it or
    something. I think that you can do with a few pics to drive the message
    home a bit, but other than that, this is magnificent blog.
    An excellent read. I will certainly be back.

  4. If some one wishes to be updated with most recent technologies after that he must be pay a
    quick visit this web page and be up to date everyday.

  5. Simply desire to say your article is as astonishing.
    The clarity in your post is simply spectacular and i could assume you are an expert on this
    subject. Fine with your permission let me
    to grab your feed to keep updated with forthcoming post.
    Thanks a million and please continue the gratifying work.

  6. Right here is the right site for everyone who wants to understand
    this topic. You know so much its almost tough to argue with you (not that
    I really would want to…HaHa). You certainly put a fresh spin on a topic which has
    been discussed for a long time. Wonderful stuff, just wonderful!

  7. Admiring the time and energy you put into your site and detailed information you provide.
    It’s awesome to come across a blog every once in a while that isn’t the same out
    of date rehashed material. Wonderful read! I’ve bookmarked your site and I’m including your RSS feeds to
    my Google account.

  8. you are really a good webmaster. The website loading speed is amazing.
    It seems that you’re doing any unique trick. In addition, The contents
    are masterpiece. you have done a great task in this topic!

  11. Hi, I do believe this is a great blog. I stumbledupon it ? I will return yet again since I saved as a favorite it. Money and freedom is the greatest way to change, may you be rich and continue to guide others.

  40. After checking out a number of the articles on your web page, I truly like your technique of writing a blog. I book-marked it to my bookmark webpage list and will be checking back in the near future. Please visit my web site too and let me know how you feel.

  43. You’ve made some good points there. I checked on the web to learn more about the issue and found most people will go along with your views on this website.

  50. When I originally left a comment I seem to have clicked the -Notify me when new comments are added- checkbox and now each time a comment is added I get 4 emails with the exact same comment. Is there a means you are able to remove me from that service? Many thanks!

  51. I don’t even know the way I finished up here, but I assumed this submit was once great. I do not recognise who you are however definitely you’re going to a well-known blogger if you aren’t already ? Cheers!

  57. Aw, this was an exceptionally nice post. Spending some time and actual effort to produce a very good article… but what can I say… I put things off a whole lot and never seem to get nearly anything done.

  58. I blog quite often and I really thank you for your information. This great article has truly peaked my interest. I’m going to bookmark your website and keep checking for new details about once a week. I subscribed to your RSS feed as well.

  62. Good site you’ve got here.. It’s difficult to find quality writing like yours nowadays. I seriously appreciate people like you! Take care!!

  63. You’re so cool! I do not think I’ve read through anything like that before. So good to find somebody with a few original thoughts on this topic. Seriously.. thanks for starting this up. This web site is something that is needed on the web, someone with a little originality!

  64. Aw, this was a very nice post. In idea I want to put in writing like this additionally ?taking time and precise effort to make an excellent article?however what can I say?I procrastinate alot and not at all seem to get something done.

  65. Hi! I just would like to offer you a huge thumbs up for the great info you have got here on this post. I will be returning to your site for more soon.

  68. Hello there! This post couldnít be written much better! Reading through this article reminds me of my previous roommate! He continually kept talking about this. I’ll forward this information to him. Pretty sure he’ll have a good read. Thanks for sharing!

  71. I’m amazed, I have to admit. Seldom do I come across a blog that’s both educative and entertaining, and without a doubt, you have hit the nail on the head. The problem is something which not enough people are speaking intelligently about. I am very happy I stumbled across this during my hunt for something relating to this.

Comments are closed.