Josep Maria Pou: “I still believe that I am the worst actor in the world” | Culture | EUROtoday

Josep Maria Pou, the actor, is actually an enormous. And now Gigante, the character of Roald Dahl, on the Círculo de Bellas Artes theater in Madrid. He already did it in Barcelona, ​​in Catalan. Mark Rosenblatt is the writer of the work. Pou (born in Mollet del Vallés, Barcelona, ​​in 1944) fell in love with that script and has positioned it as a banner that represents, proper now, the best drama on this planet: battle. The one in Gaza and, actually, all of them.

Rosenblatt’s play was born from the diatribe that Roald Dahl had after being accused of being anti-Semitic following his harsh criticism of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Now, the present appears to evoke what remains to be taking place in Palestine. The chill produced by this horrible coincidence between that point and the one we stay in now fills the Madrid theater day by day.

Ask. What is unforgettable for you in life?

Answer. Etched in hearth, one thing that by no means goes away: a failure from my childhood. I used to be an altar boy, 9, 10 years previous, in my city, Mollet. Thursday, Good Friday… Ten minutes after singing the Gloria It slipped out of my hand and the fabric that I used to be supposed to carry fell, so the picture that I used to be guarding fell. I used to be so ashamed, so scared to loss of life that, dressed as an altar boy, I ran till I reached my home. I bought into mattress, with out taking off my cassock. The most horrible failure… It accompanies me as an indication in order that it doesn’t occur once more.

P. Maybe that makes him really feel like Michael Caine. As you bear in mind, he was all the time satisfied that he was going to be fired.

R. Of course, and that is why I recognized with him all my life…

P. A severe accident additionally occurred when he was deciphering till within the Marquina.

R. Around 2001, afternoon and night on the Marquina, whereas doing the sequence Policemen. I spent my life operating… On that shoot I fell down a brutal staircase and tore the ligaments in my ankle. The traumatologist was the one from Madrid, Del Corral. His ligaments have been torn, he needed to be solid and within the afternoon he had the operate. The work couldn’t be suspended. The physician did not take heed to me, he put me in a solid as much as my knee, and that is how I went to the operate.

P. And how did he handle it?

R. The operate needed to be carried out. Josep Maria Flotats, Carlos Hipolito and I have been there, and the director was Flotats. There have been three white seats on an equally white stage. The resolution was for the others to make their method on the stage and I all the time stayed on the scene, sitting, I could not stroll even with crutches, all the time with my leg resting on the stool. When I needed to depart, I coated my face with my fingers. The viewers then understood completely that I used to be not on stage. And he took his fingers off my face when it was my flip to talk. With class and with only one hand.

P. How do you bear in mind it now?

R. It makes my hair stand on finish: on the finish individuals applauded for 5 minutes. There was my solid, with my leg within the foreground, with the fingers protruding… It was one of the crucial brutal ovations I’ve ever skilled.

P. Are you continue to afraid of failure, of being fired, like Michael Caine?

R. Not anymore. He was satisfied that he can be fired the following day as a result of he was not appropriate for the character and that the automotive would take him house. I’ve additionally had that feeling many instances. But you may’t expose your self in public if you do not have absolute confidence in your self, regardless of how a lot you doubt your self in some unspecified time in the future.

P. Height has additionally haunted him, till now he’s really gigantic.

R. That is, Gigante, nothing much less. The first movie I made was one with Fernando Guillén. We needed to make a few cops. The habits consultants warned the producer that I could not play a police officer, a lot much less a secret police officer: I used to be too tall, an agent could not be that tall. He needed to go unnoticed. They did not kick me out. I used to be that prime as a secret policeman.

P. How did it look on stage?

R. When the applause got here I instructed myself: “I have fooled them again.” Because I all the time felt like I used to be doing it mistaken. Although I nonetheless consider that I’m the worst actor on this planet, I believe that I have already got the credit score to proceed dwelling till the following premiere.

P. What does having recollections prevent from?

R. They are weapons to proceed transferring ahead. Memories fill an enormous backpack during which experiences match. When I attempt to sleep the very best factor is that recollections seem. To cost batteries… My private life is my occupation. My older brother died in his forties. I bear in mind one afternoon having a snack with him and his spouse; We all tried to assist him take the drama out of these moments. He seemed up, checked out me and stated: “I don’t want to suffer; let’s be clear: I don’t want to suffer.” Simply that. It marked me lots, I bear in mind it as an unbelievable second. I maintain it because the reminiscence I’ve of my father. We have been watching tv, and there they broke the information of somebody dying at 80 years previous. My father stated: “At that age it’s enough for me.” He did not have any sickness. He died of prostate most cancers 4 days after turning 80. There was nothing severe about him. He had stated: “At that age it’s fine for me.” As if he have been giving me an order.

P. And what has the theater been saying to you?

R. king lear It marked my life. Many instances I used to be within the scene satisfied I used to be in one other world, not the actual world. That it was another person who was on scene. That there have been no spectators. I misplaced monitor of actuality and area, floating. It was him Rey Lear whoever was there did not even depend upon me. Until I felt a click on and instructed myself: “Holy shit, the audience is there!”, after which I noticed the remainder of the solid members, and the stage, and the darkness of the viewers. But I had been absent.

P. Has it occurred to you with many works?

R. With Captain Ahab of Moby Dick, who was additionally loopy, an excessive character. You needed to get so concerned in that insanity, the textual content accompanied you a lot that what it did was tear me away from actuality from one other place, like from one other galaxy. I felt just like the character, not the actor. I keep in mind that with huge pleasure: I had the feeling that I used to be leaving my physique and seeing myself there. It wasn’t the character, it was me.

P. They have been characters that appear like you, as large as Gigante.

R. In Gigante It does seem to be it may very well be important. It requires, just like the protagonist, actors over six ft tall. Roald Dahl was a bodily large, a literary large, the characters in his kids’s tales have been giants. So the phrase large envelops his total world.

P. Is there a time when this stature of yours prevented you from doing one thing?

R. I’m certain it did, that it prevented me from performing some roles, however I have not heard of that taking place. I could not be the good-looking man on obligation at six ft tall. At 30 years previous, nonetheless, he was already taking part in the roles of cardinals, judges, troopers, and colonels. He went on stage commanding, giving orders, and that gave me numerous confidence. In Prado del Rey they known as me the Son of the Most High! Here comes Pau, the son of the Most High! And the ladies favored working with me: they needed to search for!

P. He was chosen for the facility he represented. And about energy, additionally political energy, for instance, what do you suppose now?

R. Those I performed had one thing, if not loopy, then messianic who thought they’d the facility to vary the world. If you ask me about actual energy, I believe I’ve had at instances the sensation of getting relative energy. I’ve directed two or three theaters, and that could be a small energy. And an amazing duty: energy for me is the power to do good. But take a look at what is going on now, what Robert De Niro denounces, for instance, criticizing the facility of Donald Trump. We can not permit the world to be within the fingers of a mentally ailing individual, who desires to be wealthy, an emperor and I do not know what number of different issues. I consider that energy is the opportunity of doing good in the neighborhood during which you reside. If you’ve that consciousness you are able to do fantastic issues.

P. When he debuted in Madrid with Gigante The battle had not but damaged out in Iran, however the battle in Gaza had already occurred, which the work you signify impacts. How do you expertise these coincidences?

R. It has given me extra consciousness. I’ve all the time thought that, above all, I’m a citizen dedicated to society with a small benefit: a platform that others do not need, which is a stage the place I can inform tales with which I really feel concerned and that may assist viewers, my contemporaries, to grasp sure issues by means of artwork. All my life I’ve been leftist and progressive. When I made a decision to do that efficiency, the work started to premiere in London, in October 2024. It shocked me. It might have been written by Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams or Pirandello. It was launched when the October 7 assaults in London and the Gaza genocide have been front-page materials in all of the newspapers. There I made a decision to do it now, in New York it premiered the day earlier than yesterday.

P. There you’re, speaking about what is going on proper now, giving voice to a author who was experiencing it in 1983. And it seems that comparable occasions are taking place now. How do you’re feeling up there, on stage, in entrance of the viewers?

R. It’s improbable. The motion of the present is an anecdote within the private lifetime of Roald Dahl. What he wrote precipitated a scandal: it got here from when Israel invaded Lebanon and the well-known massacres of Sabra and Shatila passed off in 1982. And it seems that historical past has repeated itself precisely the identical. Now, within the scene, I’ve felt that all the pieces occurs precisely because it did then. And it appears to me that the general public additionally receives it as if it occurred this morning.

P. How do you’re feeling as an individual telling a narrative that isn’t previous however current?

R. I really feel like I’m a health care provider telling individuals one thing mistaken. As if making an attempt to elucidate to them precisely what is going on now. I need the general public to be shocked. I really feel like a transmitter.

P. Roald Dahl’s editor performs a unprecedented function on stage. She’s Jewish, that is her character. And you, your character, are anti-Semitic. Is there a time while you, as an individual, are along with her?

R. A complete abyss separates the 2. There are two minutes during which the abyss breaks. Roald Dahl notices how she is, that she has a son with consideration issues. He then speaks to her with some kindness and tells her, within the second act, earlier than she leaves, if he misses his son. And she tells him: “Yes, I miss him, leaving him at home is very difficult.”

P. At what level are you Roald Dahl right here?

R. I actually like Roald Dahl and I perceive that. There are issues that I do not share. I separate myself when he requires the overall destruction of the State of Israel, I’m with him when I’ve to signify him as a result of it’s my obligation to grasp the character so as to take action.

P. What character would you think about for an upcoming play?

R. If he lived to be over 100 years previous, he can be Bernhard Minetti, Germany’s biggest writer of the Fifties and Nineteen Sixties. He was very excessive, he hated theater and even literature and spoke ailing of all the pieces. I might be a personality over 90 years previous who bought off a prepare with a small suitcase during which he solely carried the masks of King Lear. If I’ve one 12 months left to complete my life as an actor, then it will be Minetti.