Desperate act

Does Eva Longoria Parker have the instincts to be a diva? Not if you go by the role she chose in her latest film

Although she plays a control freak in her new movie, Over Her Dead Body, Eva Longoria Parker feels the need to emphasise that she is not a controlling person in her off-camera life.

8220;When it comes to my career, absolutely,8221; she says, 8220;My personal life, I let Tony drive that part.8221;

Tony, for those of you who go through the grocery line too fast to linger on the tabloids, is Tony Parker, San Antonio Spurs superstar point guard, whom she married last summer in a storybook wedding at a French chateau.

So, she8217;s got a new movie; she stars on the hot-again TV series Desperate Housewives as self-absorbed Gabrielle Solis; and she8217;s enjoying her new marriage to a hunk.

However, Parker, 32, does not have the instincts to be a movie diva. When she was sent the script of Over Her Dead Body and offered the leading role of the psychic who falls in love with a guy whose fiancee just died, she chose instead the supporting part of Kate, the dead bride.

8220;I said, 8216;She8217;s the funnest one in the script.8217; She gets to smoke, levitate, stir things up,8221; explains Parker. 8220;And she really drives the story forward.8221;

But, Eva, she doesn8217;t get the guy.

8220;Yeah,8221; shrugs Parker with a laugh, 8220;A minor problem.8221;

In the movie, Parker8217;s character, Kate, tries to micromanage her lavish wedding and is killed when a huge ice sculpture lands on her. No wonder Parker declared 8220;no ice sculptures8221; for her own wedding.

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With her sudden celebrity from Desperate Housewives, Parker turned to the big screen two years ago with The Sentinel, and then The Heartbreak Kid last year. Neither did well and she admits she has had more trouble in making the transition from television to cinema than many other actors.

Parker says she is up for any kind of movie role, except those that are too close to what she plays on television. 8220;There8217;s been some comparisons between Kate and Gabrielle, but I think they8217;re completely different. 8220;I think Gabrielle is more self-centered and self-serving.8217;8221; says Parker.

8220;Whereas Kate is justified in why she8217;s a little angry. She dies on her wedding day, loses the man she loves and is not ready to let go. She really believes she is saving her fianceacute;. Gabrielle would never be like that.8221;

Parker is able to travel, promoting her movie only because production of Desperate Housewives has been shuttered by the writers8217; strike. 8220;If the strike hadn8217;t been happening, I8217;d be on the set right now,8221; she says. Even if the strike were to end today, 8220;it would be two months before we8217;d be in production.8221;

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Anyway, Parker would probably be the last one to know about future story points, after she went on the TV show, The View and spilled some plot beans on the air. She laughs loudly at the mention of her slip-up, and says: 8220;I8217;m just blabby in general. I8217;m blabby all the time.8221; Besides, she says, she8217;d really rather not know what is coming up for the housewives. 8220;I love opening a script and being surprised,8221; she says.

Worst of all would be if she started reading a Desperate Housewives script and learned that a giant ice sculpture fell off a truck and killed Gabrielle.
8211; HAP ERSTEIN NYT