The 2006 nude scene that nearly gave Salma Hayek hypothermia: “Being naked, it’s never easy”
Nude scenes can be a challenge at the best of times, but Salma Hayek almost suffered greatly for her art after wading into freezing-cold temperatures without her clothes gave her “a little bit” of hypothermia.
Not that it was the first time the actor had to confront her fears when wearing very little, though, with the From Dusk Till Dawn star admitting that she was absolutely terrified of snakes before shooting her iconic scene, and she only did it because Quentin Tarantino goaded her into thinking she’d be replaced.
There were no mind games at play on this occasion, though, and it was nowhere near as gratuitous as the screenwriter of a film, who happens to have a very obvious foot fetish, penning a sequence where his character is coincidentally obliged to drink tequila directly from Hayek’s toes, the grotty bastard.
Writer and director Robert Towne’s 2006 literary adaptation, Ask the Dust, was mostly forgettable, but it does hold a unique place in Hollywood history as the fourth and so far final feature produced by Tom Cruise that he didn’t star in, which is presumably to do with his relationship with the star, since Towne wrote Days of Thunder, the first two Mission: Impossible flicks, and The Firm.
Hayek is excellent as a Mexican waitress in 1930s Los Angeles, although the same can’t be said for a miscast Colin Farrell, who plays an Italian-American writer. The pair fall for each other, and despite the clear mutual attraction between them, their romance is ultimately doomed for several reasons, not least of all the fact they can’t seem to help themselves from pushing each other away.
One sequence between her Camilla Lopez and his Arturo Bandini involves a passionate clinch in the ocean, sans apparel, and it sounds gruelling. “It was freezing! Freezing, unbearable, cold,” Hayek raged. “And I got a little bit of hypothermia. They were really careful. We had to take special drinks that would keep our body heated. I mean, we had to prepare physically to do the scene because it was so cold.”
After ditching the original shooting location because, according to Hayek, “a week before we arrived, somebody got eaten by a shark there,” Ask the Dust‘s backup beach wasn’t much better. “I thought it was going to be warm, but it wasn’t,” the Academy Award nominee added. “So they had to prepare us physically to go in the water. There was a point we had to stop because the doctor had to check on us.”
When the on-set physician discovered signs of hypothermia, “they had to pull me out immediately, and that was it.” Although it was an important moment for the characters and their on/off/on/off again dynamic, Hayek had to focus on her performance despite the elements, adding, “I was not comfortable, and I was not relaxed at all,” as you’d expect from what turned out to be a hypothermic incident.
Still, she managed to power through, and reflecting on what turned out to be one of the odder experiences of her career, the star pretty much hit the nail on the head: “Yes, it was a very complicated scene,” she declared. “Being naked, it’s never easy.”
