Jania Ashlynn
Longoria recently had a chat with ET where she looked back on some of her most memorable career highlights. She took viewers on a journey through time, from her gig on Beverly Hills, 90210 where she earned her SAG card, to her unforgettable portrayal of Gabrielle Solis on Desperate Housewives.
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A Star-Studded Start
Longoria reminisces about the time when she took direction from Tori Spelling while working on the hit show 90210. She recalls it as “the biggest show on Earth.”
“To get, you know, Flight Attendant #3 was like, ‘I’ve arrived!’ I was so happy,” she shared. “That’s like one of the first times an actor can direct. I was super professional…but inside I was fangirling for sure.”
As she reminisces about her time playing Isabella Braña on The Young and the Restless, Eva Longoria shares how landing the role in the soap opera “was the epitome of success.”
“My mom was so happy when I got the contract because I did like one line on General Hospital and one line on another soap. And I just remember that was the dream, if I could just get on a soap opera,” she shared. “Then it was a lot of work. I mean, you know, it’s a daily show. We move really fast. And, you know, I liked my bubble because I didn’t really work with anybody else except Doug Davidson and Christian LeBlanc. So I was in a really small bubble while I was on that show, but it was fun. It was a lot of fun.”
Longoria landed the role while she was still taking acting classes and she felt “so young.”
“I was just bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, and I was on set to learn,” she continued.
In 2004, Eva Longoria’s life took a dramatic turn when Desperate Housewives aired on ABC. This was a year after her stint on Y&R.
“I love that show so much, I miss my time on the show,” she shared. “I miss Gabby. I miss being Gabby; she was so fun, and she said and did things I wish I could say and do.”
Untold Stories
“I just remember pinching myself. I remember reading the script and going, ‘Well, this will never go,’ because it was so different,” Longoria continued. “It wasn’t a comedy and it wasn’t a drama. Nobody knew what we were and when we did the first table read, it was like goosebumps because it was the entire cast and it was the first time we all had met.”
As many TV shows have been revived through reboots and spin-offs, Eva Longoria isn’t convinced that Desperate Housewives could follow suit.
“I don’t know if we could do the show today. I think we’d get canceled,” she quipped. “I mean, not canceled on TV but like canceled in culture because it was so groundbreaking and we said and did so many things that were shocking at the time. I don’t know where these ladies would be now in their life.”
Eva Longoria recently revealed that creator Marc Cherry is not interested in revisiting the beloved characters from Desperate Housewives. According to Longoria, Cherry believes that the series “fully mined” the characters, and there is no need to revisit them.
“I could not sleep with one more person on that street — like, I was like, ‘I’ve slept with everybody. You’ve slept with everybody! We’ve exchanged husbands.’ It was like, ‘What else? What other stories could we possibly tell [with] these women?’ And so that’s Marc’s big, big thing; he’s like, ‘Why now?’ He doesn’t want to reboot just to reboot.”
