The actors are placed under the command of Sergio Peris-Mencheta in the adaptation of a text by the controversial Sébastien Thiéry about the identity, truth and meaning of life.
Who is really one and what are you looking for in life? The controversial French playwright Sébastien Thiéry addresses the immortal question in Who is Mr. Schmitt? , a work where comedy, suspense, drama and tragedy go hand in hand and which, in the version directed by the revolutionary Sergio Peris-Mencheta , puts Javier Gutiérrez (Asturias, 1971) and Cristina Castañ on the ropes or (Lugo, 1978), a gentleman and a Mrs. Carnero whose life changes when the telephone rings ... in a house he doesn't have.
The promotion of the work raises many questions about the truth, the lie or the madness of the protagonist ...
Javier Gutiérrez.- I do not share the possible madness of my character. For me he talks more about one's identity. About who we think we are, the image we project towards others and what others see in us.
Cristina Castaño.- When one says what one thinks, and does it vehemently, losing the forms, one is usually called crazy. I think there are moments in the show when they make Javier's character mad because they are stressing that things he sees are not true. So, by losing the forms by denying it, he seems to lose his mind.
JG- But I try to defend my character. I do not like at all to be branded crazy or think it is.
CC- It is something that society does. Many times you are right about something, but if you get vehement, you get angry and so on ... then you're already a hysterical.
JG- Hysteria is confused with madness.
Q.- Sébastien Thiéry, the author of the libretto, states that he wanted to denounce alienation, how some people accept a speech that ends up speaking for them instead of being carried away by what they feel.
JG- Yes, that's why there is the present and constant image of salmon in function. It reflects the fact of swimming against the current and going against that unique thought. Of that alignment that can be right now in society, in which if you go out of the limits that set the powers established, whoever it is, call X, they point you.
Q.- The work jumps from one genre to another. How do you deal with these registry changes?
CC- They are a very big challenge. It's hard. In the rehearsals, personally, I have encountered very complicated jumping situations that the director wanted me to do and that did not have a logic, a continuity to follow. It is a challenge, but also an incentive, that Peris-Mencheta takes you to those places that are not comfortable for you.
JG- It is the most interesting thing for an actor to be able to make a leap without a net in the same function. And, if you hurry me, from one scene to another or in the same scene: playing different sticks that go from tragedy to comedy, from comedy to terror ... It's something very interesting and that, on the other hand, makes public delights Being able to see the interpretive virtuosity of the actors I think is one of the incentives of this function.
Q.- Do you think the public will leave with a smile or a thoughtful gesture?
JG- Hopefully he comes out with a smile painted on his face, having had a good time, but also with many questions and questions about the world in which he lives.
Q.- Have you taken any reference from the French or Argentine version?
JG- When I got the text from David Serrano's hand, there was an Argentine version that seemed to me to have potential, but it wasn't much. Yes, the adaptation that Peris-Mencheta makes of the function seems brilliant, because he speaks perfectly French and was able to make a very faithful adaptation to the original text and, beyond that, make a very bright, very crazy, very funny version of Mr. Schmitt
Q.- How has it been working with Peris-Mencheta as director?
CC- I really wanted to work with him as a director. I already knew him as a partner in numerous plays and I already wanted him to direct me. And Sergio is an actor, which puts him in your place immediately and understands the processes that you are going through. I think he has a tremendous intuition, I think he is very free directing and he has personally taken me to places that were not comfortable for me and has been behind me all the time to give the maximum that I can give, so I am happy to be in this work directed by him.
JG- It is one of the great attractions of this show. He is one of the directors of the moment as well. Everything he does becomes a theatrical event that must be seen. And above all, I would highlight that it goes from the Big Show , La Cocina or Lehman Trilogy to doing intimate or small shows like An invisible piece of this world or this function, in which although there are characters on stage, in a good part of the function we are Cristina and only me. Only two characters. And that knows how to do it very well. Going from the intimate to the great any director does not know how to do it with the mastery that Sergio does.
Q.- Do you think that the vision that the general public of the theater had has changed?
JG- It has to do with the crisis there has been. There have always been great actors and actresses who have done theater. If you review the previous generations or today, you see it. But it is true, and it is something that I have never liked too much, which has been viewed with some suspicion both the authors who did theater and those who made television by many people in the cinema. Now everything has been confused and now everyone wants to make television. It's something that bothers me. An actor is an actor, regardless of the medium in which he is working. The interesting thing is the story you tell and how it reaches the viewer, the audience. Beyond that, I don't care if it's theater, cinema or television.
CC- For me it is very valuable what an actor does on television, with the means available and with the space that is available, because it is much more difficult to do a good job when you have a much more limited time to reach certain sites.
Q.- Is the myth that television gives more time to develop a character better?
JG- You have more work time, but it does not mean that you will develop it more because the pace on television is dizzying. It doesn't give you time to even taste what you're doing. Pass high above you. In the theater is where there are almost two months of rehearsals in which you can try, you can be wrong, you can go back. A function allows you to constantly test things you don't know if they will work or not. But that's what daily function is for. I consider that the natural place of the actor is the stage. It is what makes me more horny. Confront your work with the viewer. You never know what the public is going to say in front of the camera. Theater does allow you to grow as an actor.
CC- In the theater you own more your work. A director directs you and the function is mounted, but what you do, the character, is yours. They give you some guidelines and you start flying with all that. In a series or in a movie you are in the hands of the editor, the photographer, your partner ... There are many things that do not depend on you.
How have the trials been?
JG- They have been atypical trials. Like Sergio ... Well, as we all have, fortunately, we have work outside the theater, we have had to engage each other to do rehearsals and we have done it in two batches. But I also think that this way of working is very interesting because it allows you to distance yourself, see what you have done. Sergio has an interesting methodology that is to mount the show the first week from beginning to end, something that with other directors does not happen, because the first week you are landing and that then gives you a very interesting vision of where the shots of the show.
CC- Yes, you have already mounted all the movements.
JG- Directs with a speed that I had not seen until now.
Q.- Have you considered writing or directing?
CC- I would like to lead a lot. I would love to. But I'm not prepared to direct a television series or a movie film, to have images ... That's another story, another art. Different is to direct other actors, other colleagues, give them my vision of what I am seeing in the text and help them get there. I do not rule that out, but it is not now where my attention is placed. But it is true that when I work with colleagues and others my vision is critical. In that sense I am seeing what is happening, what is not; if it's coming or if not ...
JR- I am not called to write. And to direct film or television much less. I think it takes an energy or a desire to tell a story that I don't have. But I would like to direct theater. I have some idea out there. I really like directing actors. I think it has to do with this point of view that we have from outside, from colleagues, from global work. I think that Cristina and I are not actors that we are accustomed to being directed. We have our points of view, we think dialogue is very important, the proposals that one makes ... And in this case we have had a very good reception from Sergio.
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