Eva Mendes Says She And Ryan Gosling Have A 'Nonverbal Agreement' About Their Parenting
Eva Mendes is more than happy about her unspoken agreement with Ryan Gosling.
The “Hitch” star had a thriving acting career until she met Gosling while filming “The Place Beyond the Pines” (2012). She then stopped acting to spend more time with their children, Esmeralda Amada, 9, and Amada Lee, 7, but is adamant that she didn’t mind — and wanted to.
“It was like a no-brainer,” she said Tuesday in a clip from her upcoming “Today” show interview. “I’m so lucky, and I was like, if I could have this time with my children — and I still work, I just didn’t act, because acting takes you on location. It takes you away.”
“It was almost just like a nonverbal agreement that it was like, ‘OK, he’s [Gosling] going to work and I’m going to work. I’m just going to work here,’” Mendes continued about her modeling work and multiple fashion and cosmetics lines.
Mendes landed her big break after starring opposite Denzel Washington in “Training Day” (2001). Her career skyrocketed with rom-coms such as “Hitch” and crime dramas such as “We Own the Night,” but slowed after she met Gosling — as his love interest in “Pines.”
“I’ve never experienced anything like that,” Mendes said in the interview. “The way he works, his commitment to his craft, how he wants to make everything as best as it can be — and that means making his co-stars as best as they can be.”
“Unfortunately — or fortunately — there’s only one Ryan, so I pretty much stopped acting after that.”
The couple make notable efforts to protect their privacy, while their arrangement allows for at least one parent to be home with the kids at any given time. Mendes, meanwhile, publicly supports Gosling through the ups and downs of his career while juggling her own.
Mendes not only trounced “Barbie” haters in his defense, but she brought their kids to rehearsals for his performance at the Oscars. She championed it on social media afterward: “You took Ken all the way to the Oscar’s, RG. Now come home, we need to put the kids to bed.”
Mendes, who has her own makeup brand and self-titled fashion line, seems to have Gosling’s full support, however — and thanked him for “holding down the fort at home” after his Oscars performance before jetting off to Italy for a Dolce & Gabbana modeling gig.
“That’s what it’s about,” she said. “You go, you do your job the best you can and then you come home.”