Eva Longoria-Parker: Over Her Dead Body

What is tiny, gorgeous, "desperate" and wrapped in a pink baby blanket? It's hot Latina Eva Longoria-Parker! Bet you didn't guess that one. "Desperate Housewives" star Eva plays a hot ghost in a new romantic comedy entitled Over Her Dead Body and quite a bod it is. The curvy, very petite actress met with us at the posh Casa Del Mar hotel in Santa Monica, Ca. recently. She entered our interview room wearing a really cute, short Rebecca Taylor fuchsia-colored sleeveless silk/chiffon mini dress with fuchsia beading along the V-neckline. Earrings were large hoops with rose-colored diamonds and we just had to note those very, very high gold brocade Christian Louboutin heels.

Eva apologized for having a cold and was also wearing, I kid you not, a tiny, pink baby blanket around her shoulders to keep warm! During our chat, Eva often mentioned her hunky hubby San Antonio Spurs basketball star Tony Parker and insists they are happy as clams. She talked about her belief in ghosts or angels, her charity work, what's up with "Housewives", what it's like being a married lady and what it was like to levitate for a bit. Grab your baby blankie and join in...

TeenHollywood: You look great today. I just wanted to ask one question about make-up because you always look so perfectly done. Do you have any tips?

Eva: I'm a big fan of concealer and tinted moisturizer. Whenever I'm out and about, I use tinted moisturizer instead of makeup so my face can breathe. It gives enough coverage, and it still looks natural yet it covers up all the discolorations. But today, this is like team Eva [working on me].

TeenHollywood: When you read the script for Over Her Dead Body, you could probably have played the ghost or the still-living psychic gal which was actually a bigger part. Why choose the ghost?

Eva: I thought the ghost was the best character because she had all the fun stuff to do. She had all the physical comedy. Ghosts (are) obviously limitless. You can do anything and I never played a ghost and I thought 'Oh what a fun time to levitate and float and make noises'. (laughter)

TeenHollywood: But wasn't that levitating scene difficult or painful to shoot on wires?

Eva: It's such a pain in the butt to shoot those days because of the wiring and it's such a safety thing and I'm like 'I'm only raising 4 feet off the ground and I think I'll be fine.' But it's such a process doing those scenes and then because they have to digitally erase the wires, you can't really change positions; my arms had to stay out; I couldn't really do anything. So it's a little limiting in your acting, but when you see it, it looks great.

TeenHollywood: What's your take on ghosts and psychics? Do you believe in that stuff? Are you open to it?

Eva: Yeah, I'm definitely a believer in spirits, especially angels. I feel we all have people taking care of us and whether it's someone you know in the past or just a guardian angel that God has sent you, I've definitely felt guided in my life by some angels.

TeenHollywood: So who do you think is guiding you?

Eva: I had an aunt pass away and she had a very strong personality. She was a very strong, independent female and I always feel her energy around. Sometimes I can hear her telling me things to do or not to do, or that she's proud of me. She was such a strong presence in life. I did once have a psychic; she was a makeup artist once come up to me and say 'I'm sorry but this woman will not leave me alone. She's really strong and she just wants me to tell you that she's proud.' She was telling me what my aunt was saying but it was funny the way she described this personality and it was so like her to not leave her alone (laughter). The makeup artist said 'I'm sorry, but I keep hearing this woman and she won't leave until I come talk to you'. That was funny.

TeenHollywood: Your character is a bit of a control freak. Do you think you are like that at all; or just very detail-oriented maybe?

Eva: Yeah, it's definitely me in my business life. It's me in my career and my business or my restaurant or whatever I'm doing, I'm a control freak. I want to know what's going on? What's the process? What's the timeline? What's the next step? But, when it comes to my personal life, I'm the opposite. I don't have a care in the world and Tony is more that person. Tony plans dinner. Tony plans our vacations, Tony buys our cars. Tony does our house stuff. He's like 'this is what we're doing today, this is what we're doing tomorrow, this is what we're doing next week'. He's a big planner, and I'm not in my personal life. And I definitely wasn't like that at my wedding. I was stress-free the day of our wedding.

TeenHollywood: You shot this film on your "Housewives" breaks. How hard was that?

Eva: The great thing about that was that Tony was here so it was nice to have him here. I love television. I love that it's fast and we do 14 pages a day so you're barely in your trailer. We basically do a movie a week. So on my days that I was doing this movie, it was like vacation! It's two pages a day. We can watch a movie in my trailer. Tony was there. We could go and eat dinner then come back and they're still not ready. So it wasn't as hectic as people thought. It was so relaxed doing a movie. It was nice to venture out and do another character, to have a different cast, to play off a different director...it was bliss for me. It was so fun.

TeenHollywood: This character can come off as not very sympathetic but she kinda is too. I know the film was going to be titled Ghost Bitch at one time. How did you balance her so she was sympathetic?

Eva: [laughs] Yeah. I liked that title. I said I just don't want her to come off as not justified in her anger. We only had that one scene at the beginning of the movie with Paul [Rudd who plays her fiance] and I to see our relationship and then I'm dead. So you had to see, in that one scene, that he really adores me. You had that one scene to see how much I loved him, how much he loved me and how great I was and that we were really great together and that's why he was so sad that I was gone. It was a fine balance for me.

TeenHollywood: Does she compare to your "Housewives" character Gabrielle at all?

Eva: Gabrielle, I think she's more egotistical and conceited; Kate is more on a mission. She is going to protect Henry [Paul's character].

TeenHollywood: If you had some of her fun abilities and powers, what would you be doing with them?

Eva: Oh I would totally haunt Tony if I passed away [she laughs]. I am definitely staying around and sabotaging anything. I told him that. I'm like 'You're not moving on until I move on.' Yeah, I don't know. I'd scare people. I love scaring people. I always hide. My girlfriends always scare each (other). You know, like I'll be hiding behind a door and they'd walk in I'd be like (loudly and jumping forward) 'Waaaah!'. I think scaring people is the funniest thing ever. I would definitely use my powers to make voices too.

TeenHollywood: You should be in a horror movie. Do you like scary movies?

Eva: No. I like thrillers. I'm not so much for the blood and guts, hands cut off. Like Saw. Tony loves that.

TeenHollywood: Between marriage, the TV show, movies, it's got to be busy for you yet you do find time for charity work. You do some work for cancer awareness in the Latino community?

Eva: Yes. Thank God I haven't experienced anybody in my family with a child who has cancer because I can't imagine anything more difficult. I don't know if you have ever visited the children's hospital in the cancer wing, but once you go it's life changing; to meet the parents, the family and talk to the kids. There is more hope on that floor than you will see in your whole life. These kids really are resilient and they're telling the parents 'mom, it's going to be fine...mom, we're going to kill the monster.' 70% of the kids in L.A. in the children's hospital are Latino.

TeenHollywood: Why is that?

Eva: Socially we're not a culture to go the doctor early enough to catch it so usually the death rates are higher because they go too late. There's also the language barrier and finances if you don't have insurance and you can't pay. [We want to] educate our culture to get check-ups and take your kids...everything can be prevented and these kids don't have to be there.

TeenHollywood: That's a great cause. Back to the film. Your look in the movie is so different than the way you look now or even as Gabrielle. Do you have input into the way you look?

Eva: I dyed my hair lighter for the movie because I wanted to look different than Gabrielle. She was obviously, very more conservative with a type A personality. We wanted her to be in white as opposed to black. Jeff Lowell [the director] didn't want her to stay in the same outfit. He was like, 'No. She can change her outfit, but I think she should always be in white, it's angelic.' It's hard to keep white clean though (laughter). You can't touch. 'Don't touch me!'

TeenHollywood: Seems like there were opportunities for improvisation in the film. Do you remember improvising anything in particular?

Eva: Yeah. When I'm rattling off all of those numbers, colors and pet names [to disturb her rival and keep her awake]. We had to improv a lot of that and I was going like 'Orange, green, blue... You know I had a turtle one time.' I was making it up. Sometimes, just babbling on and Lake [her co-star] said that sometimes I would say things and she [wasn't allowed to] laugh and she was like, 'You had a what named what?'

TeenHollywood: With the Writers Strike, do you have a lot of downtime right now?

Eva: Yeah. I'm being a housewife as opposed to playing a housewife [she laughs].

TeenHollywood: Don't you feel weird not going to set?

Eva: Yeah, it's like I should be somewhere. Absolutely. I like routine and I like to work. I have an incredible work ethic. I love juggling everything at once so to kind of stop...the only nice part is that I have been able to enjoy marriage and being a newlywed. So I've kind of accepted that and think it's a sign from God that he just wants us to just be together at this time. Especially at the holidays it was nice to be off, but there are just too many people out of work to be like this for too long. I still stay in touch with our camera guys, hair and makeup people, electricians, grips... we were such a family and being together all the time, sharing pictures, and it's like, 'Any word? Not on my end. Any word on yours?'

TeenHollywood: If the writers go back to work, where will you pick "Housewives" up storywise?

Eva: Well, I would hope we finish season 4 because it was a weird way to end it but I [guess] we'll just start season 5. I was kind of bummed that we aired that last episode because the 'tornado episode' was such a great cliff-hanger that it would have been great to end season 4 on that as opposed to airing the episode we did film that answered a lot of questions. Now it's like, 'Eh?'. There's really no suspense.

TeenHollywood: Are you ever afraid to go and watch your husband play because you'll get the Jessica Simpson [bad luck] thing where if you're there they'll start losing?

Eva: I had that. Once Tony and I started dating you'd think I was the Yoko Ono of the Spurs [we laugh]. Really. If Tony had a bad game, it was my fault. If Tony had a good game, it was because of me. If Tony got injured, it was my fault. Anything that happened, if Tony did something, it was , 'Oh, Tony is Hollywood now.' Believe me, he's not thinking of me when he's on the court. I don't know what player it was, I think Antonio Davis, his wife was in the stands and got in a fight with a fan and he went into the stands and then he got fined. I was like 'Oh honey, would you come and rescue me if I got in a fight with a fan?' and Tony was like, 'No! I'm not getting that fee.' [we laugh] Those fines are really steep and then to get suspended, he's like 'No you're on your own.'

TeenHollywood: Aren't you working on another movie, Lower Learning? Who do you play?

Eva: I play a superintendent coming to shut down the school with Jason (Biggs, who is also in Over Her Dead Body.) Jason and I become allies and try to save the school. It was fun. Jason and I were like 'yeah'!

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Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.