Zoe Saldana Opens Up About Her Husband Marco, Gender Norms & Raising Their 3 Sons

Zoe Saldaña is opening up about her family life and her career.

The 45-year-old actress is on the cover of NET-A-PORTER’s digital title PORTER, and is getting candid about her family, her latest project, Special Ops: Lioness, and the power of representation in Hollywood.

Keep reading to find out more…

Find out what she had to say…

On her career and Latino heritage:

“There is no retirement, you know; Latinos are like that. You work until the day you die. It’s part of life. It’s part of your culture.”

On the progress made by individuals of color and females in the industry:

“When you start out and you are a person of color and you are female, you feel like you work twice as hard and it takes twice as long. We are finally reaping the benefits of all the hard labor. I honestly feel like we’re just getting started.”

On her latest project, Special Ops: Lioness:

“At first I was really scared of that role. But I have a soft spot for renegades, for people who live outside the margins of what is considered normal and acceptable, and I see them; I get them.”

On working with Nicole Kidman in Special Ops: Lioness:

“It’s so hard to act cool, like it’s normal to work with Nicole Kidman, when she’s right next to you! It’s Nicole Kidman! That’s somebody I look up to on a daily basis. She would be on my vision board… She transforms and she’s so confident.”

On her sisters:

“My sisters and I are unapologetically female. We are very proud of all the things that compose us: immigrant, first generation, Black, Latina, Caribbean, American.”

On the collective goal for their production agency, Cinestar:

“[We] find a filmmaker and a writer and a cast to tell a wonderful story that continues to represent bits of America that go everyday unseen, overlooked.”

On her desire to create opportunities for others in the entertainment industry:

“I don’t want to be the face of everything. I’m an extremely private person. I want others to shine. I want to be that pioneer who creates the stage so that others can step on it and be who they need to be.”

On her husband, Marco Perego:

“I have a partner who is an active participant in our domestic life. I know that soon it’ll be my turn to pass that baton, but he did it with love and no resentment.”

On reframing gender norms in raising her children:

“I never baby-talked to my kids. I spoke to them in this voice that you hear, and I try to the best of my ability to cater to their critical thinking. We say, ‘It’s OK for you to have your feelings the way you went about them. It’s OK to cry. It’s OK to be jealous. It’s OK to be mean sometimes. It’s OK to be scared.’ All these things, we normalize in our home, and what we do is take deep observation in the way they go about it.”

On retaining a sense of self:

“My use is best served by me giving 150% to the things that I know I’m truly good at and the things that I truly, truly love.”

To see the full feature with Zoe Saldaña, read PORTER here and/or download the NET-A-PORTER app for iPhone, iPad and Android.

Zoe Saldana also revealed why she originally turned down her latest role.