Fiorella Faltoyano (Madrid, 1950) says that a long time ago, when she was not even remotely looking into old age, a detergent brand hired her to make it its new image. Those were the times in search of change. "After making the announcement I asked them why they chose me. They said, 'Well, because you're elegant, but not too much ma'am; because you're sexy, but you don't go overboard; and because you look like a feminist, but without going overboard."

This actress, new director and also writer, premieres next Thursday the second season of We feel the inconvenience, the Movistar Plus + series in which, together with Antonio Resines and Miguel Rellán, portrays old age in the most comical and tragic way possible. And, as they say, in old age, smallpox.

In the week in which the issue of old age and abilities at a certain age have been fully involved in the Congress of Deputies thanks to the motion of censure of Vox and Ramón Tamames, Fiorella Faltoyano, at 73 years old, coined the term "the Tamames syndrome" to explain what happens to the characters of We feel the inconvenience, but also to those who are not characters: "The Tamames syndrome, in quotes and with a lot of respect, is that we want to continue in the ointment and doing what we like until the end and they do not let us".

He worked with Rellán y Resines four decades ago. Do you notice the years? Yes, of course they show. Now we are smarter, we are more beaten, but in essence we are still those thirty-somethings. We haven't changed, but obviously a lot of years have passed and a lot of things have happened to us. There is a moment in the series when one of the Rafas (Miguel Rellán) says that if you can't fuck you can't live... That's how we are. Let's see, living can be lived without almost everything, what happens is sad. The hardest thing about giving up things is learning that you have to give up what you've done all your life. It's very hard and it's very difficult. And that's precisely what the series is about, the difficulty that some of us have to give up. In We Feel the Inconvenience her role is the antithesis of the two Rafas, a vital woman, who keeps going despite getting old, in front of two men who do not accept their age or what that age means. Is this also the case in real life or is there both?
In the series I don't ask myself questions, I act. I'm more resolute than the two of them. That is, I throw myself to stay alive, to continue living. In fact, Gloria -his character- tells Rafa -Antonio Resines- to take what is happening to him as an opportunity. However, one thinks that nothing will happen to him anymore and the other tries, but he is continually frustrated. However, my character is very free, without ties, that's why I like it so much.

He refuses to let us use any aphorism to talk about old age: "Please, no elderly, no grandparents, no seniors." Fiorella Faltoyano wants to be called "old" with all her lyrics because "we are old, because I am old". However, she acknowledges that she began to feel old only two years ago, that until then there were few ailments, but that now "leaks are flooding everything."

Please, neither old, nor elderly, nor grandparents, we are old

And that's what it's about We feel the discomfort, the "leaks", what we face when we get old, how each one manages it, what you are losing, what you are gaining. It would be easy to fall into the cliché that experience is a degree and that the elderly must be listened to, because with this actress it is as difficult as it is complicated. He brims with knowledge and experience, that of someone who has been playing for more than 50 years and that of someone who has 73 chestnuts on his back. But also restlessness, like that of a twenty-year-old who wants to do what he is passionate about: "I'm not amused by anything anymore. That's also part of birthdays. You get tired of repetition. I want to do things I'm passionate about."

Does it cost so much to get old? It costs us a lot, especially those people who have had a relevant and successful life or a lot of emotion. Getting older, no, sorry, getting old and accepting that you cannot do certain things or that it is no longer in your future to do them is very difficult. And if you are a woman, much more difficult. Old age for women is a sledgehammer, a stick. It's like the end. This is what there is in society, this is the reality.
He talks about the blow of getting old... I'm feeling the blow now. Until very recently I didn't feel that at all. I have felt young when I was no longer, but now, suddenly, the leaks are flooding everything, little by little. Fortunately they are small things, but they are small things that bring small limitations. And that's when you become aware. One day in the morning you wake up and your back creaks, and then you complain to your partner: 'Fernando, today I feel terrible, today I don't know what's wrong with me'. And then Fernando looks at me and says you're old. And it puts me in my place and takes away my fear. That's it, it's hopeless. And against what has no remedy you can not fight you have to accept it.

Fiorella Faltoyano no longer likes anything, she says it is another consequence of getting old. So now he chooses his projects very carefully. They have to get excited, make them feel butterflies in their bellies, but that doesn't happen like before. He embarks on a Nobel direction waiting for a producer to want to carry out his work, but he does not obsess: "If a beautiful job comes and I feel like it, well, but if they do not call me I do not have that anguish of an actor or actress. That is, if they don't call you, they've already called you enough, right?"

Fiorella Faltoyano, in the living room of her house. ÁNGEL NAVARRETAMás of 50 years dedicated to this holy office. Has much changed?
Much. Absolutely everything has changed (...) Now there is no difference between making a movie or a series, now the casting director is a god, now they send you a script and it takes six months to start shooting, now the stars are much more stars. I know young actors who have had only one success, but come on, one and nothing more, and who complain because they arrive at the shoot and they had not been put a chair on the set. I have sat in the street and on the steps for 30 years, being the protagonist. Because now there is a current that insists on ensuring that we have lost freedoms. And if there is someone who has lived the freedoms and those of now is youWe are not really aware right now of the lack of freedoms that existed before and our mouths are very full with 'the no is that now there is no freedom either'. Now there is much more freedom and we have to be careful that they continue to be conquered, that they are protected, that we do not carry it. And at the same time there is a regression and a kind of puritanism and fear of offense that cannot be talked about because it is not politically correct. You can not smoke in public, while they detect a man who drove a DGT helicopter to the top of cocaine. I mean there's a bit of confusion between what's really important and what's really important... . I don't know if you can say now. Yes, yes, you can sayI mean that for some things we are like the law of the funnel and for other things with very wide sleeves. We have to be careful with the society we are building and focus on what is important, on the fundamental freedoms of the human being. Do not get so much into that kind of thing that is making our lives bitter. In 'do not eat chops because it is not good', in 'do not smoke because it is bad', in do not talk about sex in a very open way, but how the sex of each one has to be. I don't know, I have a bit of confusion with all this. You have it and we all have it so it seems. That is why when they now intend to rewrite the books, the works, the films ... Where are we going to go? Othello could not be written now. There are so many things on which we apply censorship because they do not seem good to us. That's why I talk about regression. Do we have to rewrite don Juan Tenorio because he is politically incorrect? Of course it is incorrect! Put Don Juan Tenorio in his time, in his situation and in his time and value him as a literary myth, not as a real person. I'm very afraid of that because we're censoring ourselves. They don't censor us like before, we censor ourselves.


Symbol of elegance since always and also sex symbol of several generations, Faltoyano does not like it now and has never liked it, although anyone who tells him his name will be accompanied by a "lady", a "great actress" or "a beauty".

For me the world of cinema is one of the least macho that exist

"I've never pretended to be a sexual icon," she says, "and elegance, because I've always been given those kinds of roles because of my sense of aesthetics. Of course I have never liked to go zarrapastrosa, but that sense for me goes further, it is a thing of the soul, "he says.

Is it difficult to be a woman and be a veteran to get good roles? In the world of cinema is where it is least difficult to be a woman. Female characters have always been necessary with greater or lesser entity, with greater or lesser presence, but there was always a woman. Sometimes a beautiful vase woman who passed by taking off her bra, which was very sad, but, I insist, they were necessary papers. So, it is not a macho worldFor me it is a world of the least macho that exist. Of course I have met macho colleagues, macho directors, macho producers, as everywhere, but the vast majority have always been people of culture quite respectful of women. She was discovered by Luis Escobar, debuted with Nati Mistral, learned from the greatest. Now, do you teach or are you still learning?
Now people don't want to be taught anything because they already know everything. If anything, they give you a lesson from time to time. And I listen to them. Why not? I always listen and try to learn. Do you have the syndrome of 'why don't they call me' Did you suffer more in the beginning or do you suffer more now? You suffer a lot more now because now I know more, a lot more things than I did when I started. I have much more to lose than I had to lose when I started. As you get older, in addition, another fear is added, the fear of the camera. Not knowing if I'm capable of doing this character or not, if the director is looking at me well or badly, if he likes me. Now all those fears are added to this complex syndrome they call the impostor. So what would you change about your profession? The self-hype, feeling so navel of the world when we do something whether it's cinema or whatever. It would take away a bit of transcendence to everything, but especially to the world of interpretation, cinema, theater, politics. That thing of feeling so important always. In general, that people stop taking themselves so seriously. A little relax, please.

According to The Trust Project criteria

Learn more

  • Series