Eva Mendes Reveals Unusual 'Bonding Experience' With Ryan Gosling

Eva Mendes, 51, shared the uncommon “bonding experience” she and now-husband Ryan Gosling, 44, shared during their early years of dating during an interview with New Beauty.

“I always thought it was a Cuban thing that we love to clean, and we love a clean kitchen,” Mendes said. “Some of my best memories from when I was little are of my mom cleaning the house over the weekend. She’d be playing a record super loudly, and it would wake me up. There was the smell of Pine-Sol and the sounds of her singing to El Puma.”

Happily, when Gosling and Mendes met while shooting the 2011 drama The Place Beyond the Pines, she found that he shared her affinity for a clean home. “He would come over. He just loved it. When my family was around, we would literally take over the kitchen. It had to be clean,” she said. “It was a bonding experience.”

Gosling and Mendes married in 2016 after five years of dating. They share daughters Esmeralda Amada, 10, and Amada Lee, nine. 

Though Mendes has long retired from acting, Gosling has spoken at length about how she continues to support his career. "While I was singing, and dancing, and playing piano and having one of the best experiences I've ever had on a film, my lady was raising our daughter, pregnant with our second and trying to help her brother fight his battle with cancer," Gosling said while accepting a Golden Globe in 2017 for his performance in La La Land. "If she hadn't taken all that on so that I could have this experience, it would surely be someone else up here other than me today.”