Penelope Cruz Covers Vogue US June 2011

Penelope Cruz looks gorgeous and radiant flaunting her natural beauty on the cover of Vogue US June 2011. The Oscar-winning actress, who became the muse of giants like Pedro Almodóvar and Woody Allen, talks to the magazine about motherhood and the changes it brings in a woman's life, but also about "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides", karaoke and post-Oscar In-N-Out burgers.

Penelope Cruz proves once again that real, inherent beauty has nothing to do with makeup and photoshop. The stunning 37-year-old actress strikes a pose for the latest cover of Vogue's US June 2011 issue looking relaxed, happy and fulfilled. Maybe it's motherhood the reason behind this radiance. As she speaks with the magazine about her son's birth, in January, Penelope breaks into tears. This is more than enough to realize that baby Leonardo changed her life.

"One second. This has never happened to me. This is really funny. I’m sorry. It’s unexpected," she says, adding that, "From the first second, you feel so much love. It is a revolutionary experience. That’s the best way I can describe it. It transforms you completely, in a second. Nature is very wise and gives you nine months to prepare, but in that moment—when you see that face, you are transformed forever."

Penelope Cruz and her husband, Javier Bardem, found out that the actress is expecting a child just before filming began for "On Stranger Tides". "I was pregnant and a pirate. A beautiful experience," she told the magazine.
Cruz also admits that even though you hear lots of things about this amazing experience from your friends, you can only feel it truly when you live it. "Even if you have heard from all your friends and family, 'This is what’s going to happen,' until it happens to you, it’s hard to understand in your soul,' Cruz says.

Penelope has always been committed to help children in need and it seems that Leo's birth intensified this feeling. "Even if you were aware of children and felt compassion, when you have your own, it multiplies," she says. "It breaks your heart to know that there are so many children in the world suffering so much."

There's no doubt whatsoever that Penelope is one of Hollywood’s natural beauties. Still, her professional experience also reveals an impressive talent. In fact, Cruz is the first Spanish-born actress to be nominated for an Academy Award, the first to win, and now the first one with a star on the Walk of Fame. She was the muse of famous directors and screenwriters like Pedro Almodóvar and Woody Allen. She won the Oscar for Allen’s "Vicky Cristina Barcelona".

As for Almodóvar, their on-screen relationship and friendship goes back to 1997’s "Live Flesh". Penelope still recalls when he told her, "I am going to write you a character that fits you like a glove". Then he did, for 'Live Flesh'. I played a whore giving birth in a bus."
Cruz also says she asked Almodóvar's help in writing her Walk of Fame speech. And Almodóvar came up with a rather unused suggestion: "If people are going to walk over you, better to be walked over on the Walk of Fame."

In the fourth installment of "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides", the actress plays Blackbeard’s daughter Angelica who shares a more complicated love story with Captain Sparrow (Johnny Depp). "They do this dance for the whole movie," Cruz says.

Asked on how she feels on starting her work again, Penelope confesses that she will feel weird the first time she will hear 'Action!' "It will feel strange the next time I hear 'Action!' I’m going to think I am on Mars," she told 'Vogue'.
With a new film with Allen set to begin filming this summer in Rome, the actress admits that even though she is excited she wants to make time for her family too. "Of course I will work, because we all need to work. But it’s very important to have time with my family."