Piña (Penélope Cruz) is one of the four main characters in the 2026 comedy-drama, The Invite. It is an adaptation of the 2020 Spanish film Sentimental (The People Upstairs), directed and written by Cesc Gay, based on his play Els veïns de dalt/Los vecinos de arriba (which translates to The Upstairs Neighbors/The People Upstairs). Check out our Bi Media entry for the movie here.
Piña is a therapist/sexologist who lives with her partner, retired firefighter Hawk (Edward Norton). They live above a troubled married couple, Angela (Olivia Wilde, who also directed) and music professor Joe (Seth Rogen). Angela and Joe invite them to dinner to address the loud sex noises coming from their apartment, but the ensuing conversations bring out many discoveries and hidden truths from all four at the dinner.
Piña is a fully fleshed-out character; Cruz gives her a fine performance and brings her to life. She is whip-smart, scary-levels astute, kind, observant, and funny. She has a deep background, honors her own boundaries, and is loyal and protective of her partner. However, she is not perfect; she is also angry and resentful of society’s dismissal of middle age, and instead of working through it, she often directs her high-powered lens of observation at others and their flaws. She also met her partner, Hawk (Edward Norton), when he was a client of hers, which is a major ethics violation for a therapist.
Regarding her bisexuality, she is calm, claims it out loud, and is confident about herself both as a bi woman and as a polyamorous person:
I’ve always been bi-curious. For me, the pleasure I get from a woman is different … We [as a couple] practice compersion. And for me, there is nothing better than watching my partner in the hands of another.
While we wish she used a stronger term than “bi-curious” to describe herself (especially since she kisses Angela in the second act and describes multiple experiences with people of different genders over time that are past the point of experimentation), we do read this as possibly a tactical choice for soft-launching an invitation for Joe and Angela to become their sexual partners, who are more straight-coded.
Piña in The Invite is a rare example of a fully-developed, middle-aged bi woman of color in modern cinema. She is alluring but also far more complex than being a bi siren on the big screen. For this reason, we note her as a significant bi character in modern cinema.