Mendes visited prostitutes to prepare for role

Eva Mendes visited prostitutes to prepare for a film role.

The Hollywood actress - who plays a drug-addled hooker in new movie 'Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call', in which she stars alongside Nicolas Cage – wanted to understand the part better and found speaking to working girls an enlightening experience.

She said: "I met with call girls, the type who met clients in grand apartments. I learned quite a bit."

The 35-year-old Latino star also revealed she had been looking forward to working with cult director Werner Herzog for the first time.

She told German magazine TV Movie: "I was bitterly disappointed. There were no tantrums, no shouting, no crazy demands. It was almost boring."

Eva recently compared 'Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call' to Picasso's artwork because it was completely different to her normal work.

She said: "It's like a piece of art to me. It really is. When you go to the museum and you see a Picasso, and you can't quite pinpoint what it is, but you know you're attracted to it, and you accept it as art."