Candela Peña (Gavá, 48 years old) takes acting so seriously that the day filming of the series about the Asunta case, which Netflix will release in the spring and in which she plays Rosario Porto (the mother convicted of the murder of her adopted daughter along with her partner, Alfonso Basterra, who committed suicide before serving time), she spent six hours vomiting until a ambulance. “I felt like all of Candela came out and that lady could now come in.” Despite her career and her indisputable status within Spanish cinema, it is not common to see her on the covers of women's magazines, something she has been demanding for years. “Not because of vanity, but because of what it means.” And no one explains better than this monumental actress, winner of three Goyas, what it means: “Beauty, like other things, is given. I am the first one who loves a beautiful woman or man. But we must give space to talent, tenacity, fight, warriors. What will the man think who told him in Got Talent to Rosalía: 'You're not worth it'? Success beautifies you, metaphorically.”
And without metaphors, on a physical level, too?
I would like to tell a woman from a rural area in Extremadura that yes, Jennifer Lopez is fifty-something years old and she looks great, but she does many, many things. That if you did them you would also be the lemon pear.
Have you not noticed any change in approach in the magazines?
There is still a lot of ageism, a lot of fatphobia. Now I have had to lose 12 kilos to play Rosario Porto and people kept telling me: “You are much better.” People celebrate thinness a lot.
And does it bother you?
When I was younger I was more aware of the external view, but now not even with the gentlemen. In other words, I don't have the energy for seduction in the sense that I want to convince the world that I am very interesting. I still like my profession, that's why I put my all into my work, but I don't want to compete in anything.
Do you remember when that turning point was?
You mature and you become more coherent with yourself. I became a single mother and my war began to be different. I have to keep in mind that one job ends and you have to have another. There have been personal and work disappointments that have led me to say: “Well look, kid, this is who I am. Whoever wants it, good, and who doesn't, too. “I don't want to ask for forgiveness anymore.”
Has the press generated the idea that you are problematic?
Well, the press and the producers. She was used to making films, which is a director, a script, everything closed. But now, when you enter these mammoths that are the series producers, you realize that you are a very small vehicle. You have to say yes to eight-episode series by reading only the first one. You read superman, you sign and when they pass it to you again you no longer fly. You're just the ugly guy with glasses in the newsroom. That's why I ask to see the scripts. And that's what seems like a problem to them. But repeating a lie many times does not make it become the truth. The only thing I have done is ask for scripts.
Has it been difficult for you to say what you think?
A lot. I've been kicked out of two series for asking for texts. One, specifically, with people I had been with to death and had responded to in previous jobs. But you never seem to stock up for the next thing. You always have to start from scratch and it is very complicated, especially if it catches you at a bad time.
And what helped you come back?
When I ran out of those two series I was very angry, because I have the right to be angry. I put on a theater performance with Pilar Castro that is titled Contractions and it is precisely about this. It is a criticism of what the system can force you to swallow to get a job. Then, when they called me for the series about Asunta case, It was to give me a role as a police officer and I asked: “Who is going to play Rosario Porto?”
How did you convince them that Porto had to be you?
Well, as I convince, with my only tool: my work. I asked them to give me three weeks to prepare for the test.
Are you afraid of the public's reaction when they see your Rosario Porto?
I have been faithful to what she says, to her texts, to her letters, to a woman who committed suicide in the pandemic believing she was innocent. I have built a woman who believed herself to be innocent and now the public lets her see and decide. When I finished filming I uploaded a photo characterized as the character and received millions of messages insulting me. There I also see that there is machismo and misogyny. Because nothing happens with father villains, male villains even generate a kind of morbid admiration: think of Hannibal Lecter… Here I have also suddenly noticed a lot of social resentment because she was a cultured aunt, from a good family. I have made my journey, I have built my Rosario Porto as if I were a Thermomix.
Are you afraid of taking sides unfairly?
Yes, but one is innocent until proven otherwise and in this case they could not prove otherwise. They were convicted, yes, but based on indications, not evidence. That's why what interested me was to create spaces of privacy, of intimacy, so that you don't know what happened there. There is my creation. Of course, I haven't seen the final cut.
They insulted her in the streets of Santiago, right?
A lot, when he was wearing the wig: “May you be making money with that murderous character!”
And what did he tell them?
Since Rosario I have been a completely educated woman who does not raise her voice, because I have created a sick woman.
Because once she put on Rosario's wig, did Candela disappear?
Yes. There will be people who say: this is crazy. But each one approaches the profession the way they want. No one got me into this industry, I have a vocation. I am the daughter of those from the Gavá bar, who when she was annoying she went to the movies. I believe much more in lies and fantasy than in reality.
When you are inside a mother, do you think about your own motherhood?
No, but I do see what people they are. The mother of lost faggot It was a mother who makes her son sick, who makes him sclerotized. Rosario Porto has the big tomato with her partner and with her internal wound, which has to do with having stopped being her father's chosen one. I come from a home where there hasn't been much attachment. My parents soon started a business and three months later they left me at my grandmother's house. That, of course, has also made me who I am.
Have you talked to your own mother about this?
Yes, what happens is that sometimes they are processes that make you end up saying at 40 what you should have said at 20. I now understand my mother's wound. She is the daughter of 14 cook brothers among whom she was not seen very much either, with a sexist mother who forced her to wash their clothes and iron their impossible hats. My mother has been taught to love in a peculiar way, she has transferred it to me and I am not the perfect lover either.
However, they never told him what to do
Absolutely. I think that since my mother was never given space to speak, she gave it to me. And if I have been able to speak in my house, in my house, which is sacred, why won't I be able to speak in the world? That's perhaps why I say my opinions freely, to be seen.
To honor his phrase princesses: “We exist because someone thinks about us”?
No. I'm not talking about getting noticed. I'm talking about being able to see what I am like in all my dimensions.
What type of mother are you?
Since I became pregnant I was very clear that I wanted to be very close to my son, but I don't put any medals on myself. I mean, all mothers can be shitty manipulators and since I am a single mother I do therapy to not screw up my son's life because I want to raise a free, healthy and respectful person.
Do you also not feel like seducing in a romantic relationship?
I can't count more times that I am the Pili of the Frankfurt bar in Gavá. In other words, people are going to see what they want to see. If you want to stop and see me, perfect. If not, then I don't have the energy to create a character like when I was young, where I reinvented myself to please others.
And how does it work?
Bad, of course. Bad, because people prefer the idea that each person has to their prejudice rather than really seeing what is behind it and taking the trouble, because it is also lazy.
You come from such a hard-working family. Do you consider yourself a worker?
I am a very hard worker, but motherhood has changed me in that way. Before I was Isabelle Huppert through life: waiting for my great role to arrive. Until Isabel Coixet, who is a friend of hers, told me: “It is better to make bad films than not to make films. Do not stay at home”. La Maura also told me: “No one remembers the bad movies. You're a comedian and you have good hair, so you'll have a career all your life.” I loved her.
Nowadays there are many girl actresses who, in addition to the tyranny of the castings They are subject to that of social networks…
I have skipped that war. Ester Expósito the other day she made a speech that I really liked and I thought, well look, smell her balls. It seemed like pure art to me. But I think that within her, well, she will have her wound, her journey, her torment. Go figure.
Have you already had the porn conversation with your son?
I want him to have a very healthy sexuality for him and for the women who come or the men or the men, whatever he decides. But in his house there will be freedom and he will be aware that his body will give him joy for the rest of his life. This starts today and doesn't end.
Now that the series is going to premiere in 190 countries, do you fantasize about an international career?
Because I greatly admire certain Argentine actors, I have fantasized about being able to work in Argentina; But the race outside is a catty mentality, and even more so now with the platforms. What I want are good characters, wherever they give them to me. Red carpets… I'm not crazy about that anymore. Not with that, not with anything.
Credits
Photography Txema Yeste
Fashion Direction Juan Cebrian
Makeup and hairdressing Natalia Belda (Mr. Perez) for Armani Beauty and Sebastian Professional
Manicure Lucero Hurtado
set design Virginia Sancho
Production Christina Serrano
Photography assistants Daniel Gallar and Daniel Carretero
Digital assistant Jessica Rodriguez
Styling assistant Paula Alcalde
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