Eva Santolaria: "I have the feeling that the industry sees me as brainless"

• The Chimpún Interview Sunday Conversations
• 'Citas Barcelona' The reunion of Quimi and Valle

Valle and Quimi meet again 25 years later. The protagonists of the story of youthful love-heartbreak that marked a generation in Compañeros will coincide again in Citas Barcelona, the series that Amazon Prime will premiere in June. But it's not them, the fictional characters audiences love, but their actors, the real people their old success never quite abandons. For better or worse. Eva Santolaria (Barcelona, 1975) chats sitting in her teenage son's gamer chair. Whether nostalgia accepts it or not, time passes.

Eva Santolaria.GORKA LOAIZAWhat happened here? Life. Life has happened. Obviously, what has marked me most in these 25 years has been my family, my two children, but many other things have also happened, some public and others not so much, that make me feel more mature, more woman, another person very different from Valle.

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María León: "My mother used to say, 'This girl is half dumb, the poor one. You'll notice.' And sure enough, I realized."

• Writing: IÑAKO DÍAZ-GUERRA Madrid

María León: "My mother used to say, 'This girl is half dumb, the poor one. You'll notice.' And sure enough, I realized, "Is it impossible to run away from such a past? Have you tried it? I don't want to run away from it, at least not anymore. There was a moment, when I was in the thick of the fan phenomenon, that I thought, I wished, to be able to dedicate myself to this, but without having that excessive popularity that inevitably affects your personal and private life. 24 hours a day I felt that I was that character and that people loved me very much, but I wasn't sure if they really wanted me or Valle. There if I wanted to vindicate myself, shout that I am not Valle. To begin with because I wasn't and I'm not as cool as she was. We were taken all so young... An age when being cool mattered a lot. Of course, then the competition between my real life and that of my character was complicated, the bar was very high. I didn't have that gang or it was so cool or we fought against the mafia and we were victorious. My personal life was not what you saw on the screens. I was a happy girl and teenager, but nothing to do with what people thought. Then, at that moment you close down a little bit, you get into a bubble and secretly dream of escaping that boom of fame and living a much more balanced thing where people approach you because they like your work and admire you as an actress, not just for the character they think you are. It created a confusion between person and character difficult to carry. That role of 'the perfect bride' was exploited quite a bit. Do you know what I think was the key to Compañeros? That we weren't especially handsome. There was a casting of normal kids, similar to the students you could find in your class. It was a series that showed that many times being the handsome or the pretty is not necessarily because of a physical trait, that the attractiveness comes from the character, the head, the rebellion ... People identified with us because we were not unreachable. In my career I have neither encouraged nor been given characters of the typical cannon woman. Let's see, I'm like that, thin, little thing, no curves ... A very walking around the house thing [laughs]. I'd like to think that I can now be the normal, relatable mature woman to people just like I was the normal high school classmate. Someone to identify with, not that unattainable woman where the signs of time are not visible. I've never been interested in being that. Time passes and passes for everyone, I don't think we have to hide it. Fame, twenty-somethings... Give me carnaza. Little I can give you, we did not miss the clamp. We understood what was happening to us in a very similar way and we made a lot of pineapple. My memory of that time is many hours working and, at the end, we had parties at home or went to the typical bar that you would never enter because it is empty. I remember it as a wonderful time. What it cost me was to become the center of attention. I was very embarrassed and very embarrassed. I had never been the popular girl in my school and when I went out with my friends to a disco the handsome boy did not approach me, it was the friend who stayed with the friend of the handsome waiting to see how it was [laughs]. When, suddenly, the handsome guy from the disco came for me... I took it pretty badly. Did you distrust everyone? Of the new ones. I started to have many more friends and everyone was very nice with you, but I knew that my shyness makes me a little edge, I have a hard time opening up and I had not had time to change so much.omo to have so many friends. I had ex-boyfriends everywhere that I didn't even know. There were a few years when I had a hard time opening up and trusting that a person would approach me for who I really was, with my 50,000 defects, and not for what they saw on the screen. I had a hard time stopping being defensive. How was the professional reunion with Antonio Hortelano [Quimi]? Wonderful. It is very strong because in 25 years we have not coincided again working and suddenly... All the complicity, all the understanding and all the laughter were still there. There are people, few, with whom you work and you say: "Poof, that's it." And with Toni it has always been like that. Although we are a bit by the expectations of many people, because in the end the characters are not Quimi and Valle ... But it has been a wonderful experience, as if on Friday the last shot of Companions had been filmed and the following Monday, the first of Appointments. You are in full return to the foreground, with this series and preparing the second season of Everyone lies, where you are also a screenwriter, but you were many years almost disappeared. It's complicated because it's not something I decided, it's not like I said, "Now I'm going to have a lower profile and work less for a few years." The truth is that I was naïve in a period of my life: I made a series of decisions and it got a little out of hand. I thought that nothing would happen, that with the success of Companions and Seven Lives I was already established and could afford things that, in reality, I could not. Now, with the perspective of time, I would tell you that I still passed. There I disappeared.What decisions are you referring to? Obviously motherhood influenced, but it was not the only thing. At the same time, I moved to Barcelona. I lived in Madrid, where I still have a house, but since we are both from Barcelona and here we had our families, it was easier for us to establish the base camp here. That was very noticeable, because when you live in Madrid, which is where almost everything is cooked, your presence is constant, people always have you in mind because, simply, you go to the theater, the cinema or dinner and you always end up meeting a lot of people. You are always there and, when casting, you appear in the imagination of the person who has to say: "Oysters, Eva would fit". But if you disappear because you change cities, little by little you forget. And to top it off at that same time I had the great idea of being two and a half years without a representative, so they did not see me or anyone reminded them that I existed. All the decisions I have made at a professional level have been thoughtful, I am not impulsive... But sometimes I'm wrong. How did you react? I chose to do plays and I was lucky enough to do a wonderful tour with Carmen Machí in the Auto function, which is one of the things I would repeat a thousand times, but obviously I left the media spotlight because it did not appear on screen. Many things were added that make you disappear from the imaginary and then it is not as easy to return as you think. When you have already worked a lot, you meet a lot of people and the public loves you, you trust yourself, you think you are already fixed there, but oblivion is fast. How much did that forgetfulness hurt you? I got along well because I wasn't very conscious while it was happening. On a personal level I was very focused on motherhood and, although you realize that the level of work is not the same asAnd before, I was doing things and I thought it was not so much. I wasn't quite aware that it had actually disappeared. Then a director called me for his film and, eating one day, he said: "Notice that I thought you were going to say no to us because you had retired because of fame and all that, to dedicate yourself to the family." And I: "Withdraw? What do you say, if I'm super young? I don't understand." I was scratched. That night I went to the theater to see Miguel Rellán [his teacher in Compañeros] and I told him about it when we were returning by subway. And he told me: "Well, a little bit is what we all think, I myself now can't help but think what has become of your life." That's when I realized, "Oysters, I've really disappeared." That's when I became aware and realized that I needed to change and come back. As everything went so well so quickly, I took too many things for granted and that led to oblivion. Now I'm aware of how difficult it is to have all that and I think my comeback is a job I'm not done yet. In addition, the panorama has changed a lot compared to when we did Compañeros or Siete Vidas, because now you can do a job that more or less goes well and, even so, the social impact it has is not very great and it still seems that you have not done anything. Before, there were millions of viewers who saw you, now there are thousands. Before you could not walk two meters without being stopped and now you enter the cafeteria and they do not tell you anything. Then it's even harder for people to know you're active. How does the industry see you? I have the feeling that he sees me as brainless. No, seriously, they don't give me mother papers! But, let's see, I have two children and I swear they are mentally super healthy. I think [laughs]. It's funny because the years go by and nothing. I will start one day to be a grandmother and I will not have passed for a mother. Maybe it's because I've always appeared to be younger than I am and my physique ends up taking its toll because I don't fall within the parameters established by the industry as a super mega sexy cannon woman nor, either, within those of the mother. It's hard to locate. I'm old enough to be pretty thirty and I look too young to be the mother, which is absurd and an absolutely macho vision. Sometimes I have the feeling that mothers and professional women in positions of responsibility, be it a judge, a politician or a surgeon, have to appear totally bitter in order to be taken seriously. Have a lady's look. Exactly. She looks like a lady with bad milk and a little bitter, because as you smile and it occurs to you to say that you also like to drink a few shots with friends from time to time, you are the worst, you can not be a mother, you can not be a judge and you can not be a surgeon. We have to change this idea because that's not how the women around me are, who are absolutely capable people, in positions of responsibility, with their family and their children and who love to have fun. It was just missing!

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