TOUR de FORCE

ZOE SALDAÑAhas lit up some of the mostOTHERWORLDLY sci-fi epicsof our time. But with herPERFORMANCE in the musicalEMILIA PÉREZ, she finally getsto REVEAL the very HUMANSOURCE of that POWER.

- Story by KAITLYN GREENIDGEPhotographs by LARISSA HOFMANNStyling by CARLOS NAZARIO

Trench coat, DOLCE & GABBANA. Tubogas necklace with a central rubellite, BULGARI. Tights, WOLFORD. Shoes, GIANVITO ROSSI. Band ring (throughout), Saldaña's own.

Zoe Saldaña is in the passenger seat of a car, squinting at me in the glare of a particularly generous sun as the expanse of Southern California blue sky and tan desert flashes behind her. Her long dark hair skims her shoulders. It's an apt setting for the perpetual-motion machine of promotion that she's currently at the center of; with her role in the buzzy drug-cartel-thriller-cum-musical Emilia Pérez, she is in contention for every major film award for the first time in her 25-year-long career.

Saldaña is en route to a hotel to prepare are for an event later tonight, part of the endless rounds of parties and appearances that make up a campaign during awards season. She's in the thick of it, even though she tells me, "I don't like networking." When she started as an actor, she explains, "Every time I went [to a party], I would end up overdrinking and still doing the thing that I wanted to do in the first place, which was to dance and laugh and that's it. When we're all working, that's when magic should happen. Your evenings should be for you to do things that feed your soul."

Midi dress and tulle culottes, GUCCI.

Saldaña, 46, has starred in some of the biggest blockbuster franchises of our time: Avatar, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Star Trek. Rita, the overlooked and overworked attorney she plays in Emilia Pérez, feels like both a departure from the action and sci-fi worlds she typically inhabits and also a culmination for the actor who impressed a generation with her performances as a dancer in cult-favorite early-aughts films like Center Stage and Drumline.