The Pirates of the Caribbean almost sunk Zoe Saldana's acting career.
The now-pregnant actress, 36, sat down for an extended interview with The Hollywood Reporter, which ran on Wednesday, July 23, and admitted that filming the 2003 blockbuster was traumatic. Saldana appeared in the hugely successful action-adventure flick as a female pirate named Anamaria, starring alongside Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp, and Keira Knightley.
"Those weren't the right people for me — I'm not talking about the cast," she told the Hollywood Reporter. "The cast was great. I'm talking about the political stuff that went on behind closed doors. It was a lot of above-the-line versus below-the-line, extras versus actors, producers versus PAs."
"It was very elitist," Saldana continued. "I almost quit the business. I was 23 years old, and I was like, 'F—-k this!' I am never putting myself in this situation again. People disrespecting me because they look at my number on a call sheet and they think I'm not important. F–k you."
Thankfully for Saldana and her many fans, she clearly did not follow through on her urge to throw in the towel. Next week, she hits the big screen in Guardians of the Galaxy, after high-profile roles in mega-franchises such as Avatar and Star Trek.
This isn't the first time that Saldana has spoken less-than-favorably about her time filming the big-budget pirate movie.
In August 2011, she told The Independent, "I didn't like the experience of working on Pirates and I feel that it is my job to be completely honest. To me, that's what a Hollywood movie felt like. If that's what I have to witness, and have to go through, to do a Hollywood movie, I'd rather do something else… It was just too massive. You really felt the immensity of it. Just not my taste."
