Zoe Saldaña On the Essentials She Keeps In Her Bag, from Her New iPhone 16 Pro to Legos
The Oscar winner talks about parenting, her "so normal and relatable" new campaign for T-Mobile and the other screen (besides her smartphone) that she never leaves home without.
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CANNES, FRANCE - MAY 14: Zoe Saldana attends the "Mission Impossible - The Final Reckoning" red carpet at the 78th annual Cannes Film Festival at Palais des Festivals on May 14, 2025 in Cannes, France. Andreas Rentz/Getty Images
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After winning her first Oscar for playing a disillusioned lawyer in Emilia Pérez, Zoe Saldaña is stepping into a more “relatable” role.
The Lioness actress channels her real-life role as her family’s porter in a new campaign for T-Mobile. In the spot, the 46-year-old Avatar star discovers she gets Apple’s iPhone 16 Pro for free without trading in another device when switching to the wireless service — but insists on offering something up anyway.
“I feel like I have to give you something in return for karma,” she says before offering up a box of raisins, a balloon and a banana peel from what appears to be Cuyana’s dark brown leather Paloma tote bag. (It’s the larger version of the silhouette once spotted on Meghan Markle.) Saldaña then dumps out the entirety of her carryall, which includes a bottle of red El Yucateco hot sauce, various toys, a green apple, a myriad of hair ties, a tin box of Altoids mints, what appears to be Supergoop! suncreen, more skin-care products and a mini yogurt drink, among other miscellaneous mom items.
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“It was a lot of fun to shoot,” Saldaña says of her second partnership with T-Mobile. “I had a great experience the first time around, so to receive this invitation to do another commercial, I jumped at the opportunity. I went bonkers when I read the script and it was definitely going to be about something so normal and so relatable as what’s living in your mom bag.”
Saldaña and her husband, Italian artist Marco Perego-Saldaña, share three sons (10-year-old twins and an 8-year-old), who she says have been asking for their own phones.
“The phone has become a conversation with the 10-year-olds right now,” she tells THR. “And we’re okay with repeating the big sermon: ‘You will have it eventually, but right now, everything that you may need that comes from a phone, we can provide.’ My kids right now, they’re going through a period where, yes, they’ll talk about it, but when we do give them the phone, they just want to look at their baby pictures.”
Up next, Saldaña lends her voice to Pixar’s Elio as Aunt Olga (in theaters on June 20) and reprises her role as Neytiri in Avatar: Fire and Ash (out Dec. 19 and expected to run slightly longer than The Way of Water).
Here, the Oscar winner shares what’s actually in her bag right now (from beauty products to reading material), the activity helped fuel her during the whirlwind Emilia Pérez press tour and how she approaches screen time with her three children. Read on for her travel must-haves, plus product picks inspired by Saldaña’s essentials.
You pull a ton of stuff out of your bag in the T-Mobile spot. What are some of the most random things you’ve found in your bag in real life?
Oh my god. Girl, please! I have been known to have snacks in containers that open up all the time at the bottom of my bag. Sometimes it smells cheesy and it’s just great. I like to have Legos and pieces of [my sons’] Legos with me in my bag because when I travel, grabbing that surprise always makes me smile. I’ve had socks clean and dirty in my bag. A shoe — not a pair — just a shoe. I’ve mentioned earlier in an interview where I’ve walked out with all the car keys. … [I’ve had] other people’s cell phones, not my own, weird things like that. I’ve had ants in my bag!
One of my boys has this thing where even if it’s a little piece of a sandwich or a banana or just a little piece of something, he’s like, “Please save it for me.” And then they’ll just dump it in my bag.
What do you keep in your bag for yourself that helps you stay on top of your creativity?
A friend gave me his lucky coin. I believe that we have the power to set our own destiny, but every now and then when I meet people that are more superstitious than I am, I don’t like to question them. So he gave me his lucky coin. I took it in January and I felt really lucky the whole time.
I always have a Kindle with me and that always helps me catch up with my reading. I just got into audiobooks because when I’m not doing something physically, I’m sort of falling asleep and reading has become a challenge. But I’m an avid reader, so at least listening to audiobooks, I get to read as many books as I can.
Amazon Kindle Paperwhite Signature Edition (32 GB)
Throughout the whole Emelia Pérez tour, I read books and that kept me sane. And then a girlfriend just made it permissible for me to read two books at a time. She goes, why do you only have at a time, just double bang it, like two books at a time and you’re going to be fine. I started keeping up with both stories.
Right now I’m reading two books. One is called Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano, and the other one is The Love We Found by Jill Santopolo. And before that it was Think You’ll Be Happy by Nicole Avant, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I read the Britney Spears book, the Barbara Streisand memoir. … Because she did her own audiobook of her book, love Listening. That’s what gets me by. Whether I’m home and I’m taking, I’m getting ready and I’m taking the kids to school on my way back from full drop off, I’m starting that audiobook. … If I’m driving more than an hour, it’s just audiobook. If I’m working out, it’s an audiobook. When I’m in hair and makeup, whenever I’m not talking to my team — because I’m very chatty — It’s the way I exercise, channeling my characters and things like that. But I will, I’ll listen to an audiobook. I’ll make everybody listen to it.
‘Hello Beautiful’ (Oprah’s Book Club) by Ann Napolitano
$17.72 $20.25 12% off
‘The Love We Found’ by Jill Santopolo
$17.33 $19.80 12% off
‘Think You’ll Be Happy: Moving Through Grief with Grit, Grace, and Gratitude’ by Nicole Avant
$18.10 $20.69 13% off
‘Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow’ by Gabrielle Zevin
$17.72 $20.25 12% off
Since you travel often, what are some of your must-haves when you’re on the go?
Blotting paper!
Tatcha Aburatorigami Japanese Blotting Papers
And at least four or five lip glosses. In the early 2000s and I was introduced to lip plumpers. I am a sucker for them. I love anything that makes my lips feel tingly! And moisturizer. California can be a really dry place. We love the sun, but there’s the perils of sunny California means that your lips are sometimes on the dry side. I like to have a variation of a moisturizer.
Armani Beauty Prisma Glass Hydrating Lip Gloss with Squalane
Too Faced Lip Injection Power Plumping Hydrating Liquid Lip Balm
Pixi LipLift Max
I wish I was more organized, but lately I feel that my essential thing to do is to not forget any of my kids. But as a result, everything else right now, my travel essentials are my children and they have to come. They’re so well-traveled and they have their essentials, but for some reason they don’t want to carry their essentials! Balls, Transformers, now they’re into sunglasses. Hats, in case they feel like wearing it, but they won’t.
We’re just porters.
We’re like 24-hour concierge service! “Get this for me, buy this for me, can I have a play date, I like this, I don’t like this one.” But you know, [there’s] the power of the word “no.” I went through this stage earlier when they were babies where modern psychology, progressive parenting tells you to say yes and yes and yes to your kids, but “no” kept me alive. So I am learning again to reacquaint myself with the word no. No, bud. No, thank you!
Since we’re on the topic of tech, what’s your approach to screen time with three kids?
My kids are like 10 going on Y Tu Mamà También, I’m going crazy. They grow up and they fall in love and they read “adult” books — and they mean books with no pictures on them, so when they say a textbook, it’s kind of adorable. And they’re into Adam Sandler and Will Ferrell movies — not all of them, because we do have to curate that!
The phone has become a conversation with the 10-year-olds right now. And we’re okay with repeating the big sermon: “You will have it eventually, but right now, everything that you may need that comes from a phone, we can provide.” My kids right now, they’re going through a period where, yes, they’ll talk about it, but when we do give them the phone, they just want to look at their baby pictures.
Speaking of tech, what are your go-to phone features or apps?
My husband is a lot more sex savvy than I am, and my sister is too. I’m very much into — I’m looking right now to see the apps that I’m — yeah, no, no. Honestly, I’m boring!
But I love when my phones have a good camera because I am all about capturing moments in my life. In the commercial, I kept talking about the iPhone 16, and they were super kind enough to give me a phone, so I told them, I don’t know the difference between any of ’em, but I do want you guys to get me the one that has the best camera.
Apple iPhone 16 Pro
Free at T-Mobile
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