Frida: Seven Years in the Making

The first time I’d seen “Frida” starring Salma Hayek, also served as one of two Producers of the film, was when I was a student in A.P. Art History. My professor was deeply fascinated in the subject of art and once he took the entire class, combined students of thirteen, to the cinema and watched the film as a class. It was an amazing experience because we were permitted off school campus and we had the privilege of watching a film entirely on the subject of art history and the biography of Frida Kahlo.

Unfortunately, Salma Hayek failed to win the Oscar for Best Actress at the 2003, Academy Awards®; Nicole Kidman won for her performance in The Hours. I felt Salma Hayek’s performance was much more convincing, artistic, and simply ravishing. Salma was Frida and why not? Salma embarked on a seven years journey to buy the rights to the publication, funding, and the director. Salma did not want to put her entire dedication into the wrong hands; luckily, Julie Taymor, the first woman to win the prestigious Tony® award for Best Direction for her Broadway hit The Lion King®, was hired as the film’s director. Together, as women, they both collaborated brilliantly, and the film’s crew was conducted by many elite and acclaimed filmmakers in Mexico, they include: writer, Gregory Nava, directed Jennifer Lopez in Selena; Academy Award® winner composer Elliot Goldenthal, notably for Neil Jordan’s Interview with the Vampire; and lastly, Director of Photography Rodrigo Preito, worked with Ang Lee in the Academy Award® winning film Brokeback Mountain. Also, many well-known film stars like Alfred Molina, Antonio Banderas, Mia Maestro, Edward Rush, Ashley Judd, and Edward Norton, all to whom are dearest friends of Salma Hayek, all agreed to work for low wages for their performances.