{blackbabes} Saldana: Hollywood should pay child care

LOS ANGELES — Meet Mama Bear Saldana.

From her artist husband Marco Perego taking her last name to speed-dialing her nanny en route to her latest premiere, Zoe Saldana's life has shifted remarkably since she shot the comic drama Infinitely Polar Bear two years ago.

"I'm so sorry," she says, bare-faced and running late after taking her 6-month-old twin sons, Cy and Bowie, to the doctor for a checkup in preparation for her brood's relocation to the Vancouver set of Star Trek 3.

In Polar Bear (opens Friday in New York and L.A.), Saldana, 36, plays Maggie Stuart, a woman determined to pull her bipolar husband, Cam (Mark Ruffalo), and their two young children out of poverty.

Director Maya Forbes, who based Polar Bear on her early life, found Saldana much like her own resilient mother, who broke with convention to become the one of the first African-American women to open her own hedge fund.

"I was drawn to Zoe because she had this strength and vitality," says Forbes. "I'm sure that's why she plays all these superheroes and assassins. A mother's a superhero, right?"

In honor of #SillySaturday...looking forward to the premiere tomorrow of #InfinitelyPolarBear!

Saldana has a superhero-sized year ahead, balancing a potent mix of independent releases and international box-office draws. After Star Trek, she'll shoot James Cameron's three Avatar sequels, Guardians of the Galaxy 2 and Ben Affleck's Prohibition-era drama Live By Night.

With a film history that has grossed $2.5 billion domestically, "she's created a tremendous career, and she's done it very quietly," says Paul Dergarabedian, senior analyst for entertainment research company Rentrak, calling her Chris Pratt's counterpart as the go-to kick-butt action star.

Just as Polar Bear narrates Cam's condition plainly ("My father laid it right out there," says Forbes), so, too, does Saldana address her life. Last week, the actress staunchly defended her husband's decision to take her name (their twins also have both last names). Online, "there were more men than you would expect going, 'I changed it and that was 10 years ago!' " she says. "Marco felt great doing it."

Yet after the birth of her twins, a stark reality has surfaced.

"Let me tell you something, it will never be the right time for anybody in your life that you get pregnant," says Saldana, noting that last year, "the productions I was slated to work on sort of had a panic. I heard through the grapevine there was even a conversation of me being written off of one of the projects."

Her reaction?

"I was like, 'Oh, my God, are you kidding me? It's this bad?' Right when I just feel super-duper happy, is that inconvenient for you? That me, as a woman in my thirties, I finally am in love and I am finally starting my life? And it's (screwing) your schedule up? Really?"

Delays stalled production, and Saldana wasn't written out of any of her upcoming films. But her team fought to have child care included in her deals — a frustrating argument, she says.

Statistically, few parents have access to company-provided child care. According to a 2014 study conducted by the Families and Work Institute, only 20% of large employers (with 1,000 or more employees) provide child care at the workplace, and just 5% contribute financially toward it.

Still, studios "spend more money sometimes 'perking' up male superstars in a movie," she says, paying for private jets, a coterie of assistants and bodyguards or booking "a really phat penthouse or them staying in a yacht instead of them staying on land."

"But then a woman comes in going, 'OK, I have a child. You're taking me away from my home. You're taking my children away from their home. And you're going to make me work a lot more hours than I usually would if I was home. Therefore, I would have to pay for this nanny for more hours — so I kind of need that. And they go, 'Nope, we don't pay for nannies.' "

Instagram | @zoesaldana

Watching their Mami on #JimmyKimmelLive. #FamilyFridays

USA TODAY contacted Paramount, which produces Star Trek (Saldana's next film); the studio declined to comment. "With any production, there is always a negotiating process," says Saldana's representative, Gary Mantoosh. "The issue had been resolved prior to when this interview was conducted."

Despite the emotional roller coaster of going back to work, Saldana says she loves her job. "The battle will always be in trying to balance it out," says Saldana. "That's the most exhausting thing, the balance of it all. But it helps when you're doing it with your companion. If I know Marco is trying to balance it as well, then I feel like I'm not alone."