At 43, the Bilbao native is favorite for the Goya for best supporting actor after winning the Feroz for his role as ETA member Luis Carrasco in ‘Maixabel’
Everyone who has seen ‘Maixabel’ has stayed with him. Urko Olazabal (Bilbao, 1978) plays Luis Carrasco in Icíar Bollaín’s film, one of the ETA members who murdered Juan Mari Jáuregui and the first to participate in the ‘restorative meetings’ with his widow. After winning the Premio Feroz for best supporting actor, everything indicates that the Goya will be on February 12 for this acting teacher who has directed short films in India and Mongolia, overcome cancer and rediscovered his vocation thanks to his students and his wife . These days he has to yearn for his house in Muskiz and attend to the offers that crowd him in Madrid: “My representative has a table full of proposals for movies and series, some with important directors,” he acknowledges. “The problem is going to be being able to do them all.”
– Compete against three great actors from ‘The Good Boss’: Celso Bugallo, Fernando Albizu and Manolo Solo. But favorite part.
-The other day the supporting actors had a meeting at the Film Academy. They predicted that the Goya was going to be for me. I was very amused. As there are three for the same film, they believe that the votes are going to be distributed and that I have won them. The Goyas are not an exact science.
–With what attitude are you going to go to the Goya gala in Valencia?
-The road to the nomination has been incredible. Passing the casting and meeting Icíar was milk. Then everything has been a sum and continues. I go with my wife happy and content, we will eat a paella and I will enjoy my first Goya.
Urko Olazabal with Luis Tosar in ‘Maixabel’.
–Everyone who sees ‘Maixabel’ stays with you. Not only because he is superb, but because the film gives a lot of prominence to Luis Carrasco.
-When reading the script I was surprised that my character was morally ahead of Luis Tosar. It’s like Jiminy Cricket showing Ibon Etxezarreta the way. The editing has been faithful to the script and that has benefited my visibility. In some review I read that I have the ‘momentum’ of the film.
–Did you impose acting with Luis Tosar and Blanca Portillo?
-On the contrary. I’ve been doing castings all my life, since I did theater I dreamed of being a movie actor. I really wanted to perform with them. I managed to corner my nerves so they wouldn’t betray me before shooting. The first day I had Luis and a lot of extras looking at me. Lots of pressure. But I worked from relaxation and concentration.
–He had a long interview with Luis Carrasco to prepare the character. Who was found?
I met a deeply repentant person. Someone who wanted to be there with me and tell their story. He saw that I could be the vehicle to make his situation of repentance visible and show society that there are people who have murdered and have realized that they did not do well. That weapons were not the vehicle to liberate Euskal Herria. I saw someone defeated in the hope of finding a job and getting a foot in society. ETA’s repentant are between two waters: the radical nationalist left cannot look at them, but neither can the victims. They just want to continue living with dignity.
Have you had contact with him again?
-Some WhatsApp. He saw the film and was grateful that it was made. ‘Maixabel’ and her life are examples that there are second chances. It is time to start taking off all the weight that this has had on us and live in peace. We are tired of so much violence.
–He has played two ETA members, Luis Carrasco in ‘Maixabel’ and Josu Bolinaga, kidnapper of Ortega Lara, in ‘El instant decisive’, and a victim of ETA, Manuel Zamarreño, in ‘Patria’. Wasn’t he schizophrenic?
– In the end, an actor has to carry out a role, whether you like what that character did or not. You don’t have to judge him as a person, but try to understand why he did those things. He can scare you, but you can’t judge him. I always tell my students that with each character there are unpleasant things to do, you can’t take that work home. You play with a sensitive material, although Stanislavski can say the opposite.
Advice to students
What do you learn from your students?
– 80% of this golden moment that I live is theirs. Look, Icíar doesn’t shout ‘action’ on the set, but ‘whenever you want’. At that moment of maximum concentration I keep in mind the advice I give my students. They are my ‘coach’, my ‘training’. Without them I would not have recycled myself as an actor. If I have so much work from now on, I don’t know how I’m going to teach them. I hope it’s not detrimental to my quality as an actor…
Urko Olazabal with the Feroz Award for best supporting actor for ‘Maixabel’.
-Because he was about to stop acting.
“Ten years ago, when I was young and rougher than a plow, I had lymphoma. A process of a year and a half with chemotherapy and radiotherapy. A moment in which my life stopped dead and I began to notice other things. You are contemplative and see death up close. Society advances and you are left behind. I remember the feeling of being in a basement, leaning out of a small window on the pavement through which I could see people’s feet passing by. That time taught me to observe, to walk the earth in a different way, to have a completely different sensitivity. I don’t wish a disease like this on anyone, but it changed my life.
“I don’t wish a disease like this on anyone, but it changed my life”
«I was left without a penny and I worked in a pastry shop. I understood that the dream was over»
-It had a happy ending.
-Very happy. As soon as I got out of cancer they called me for a leading role in ‘Ira’. When the movie was released in theaters, nobody called me. And I didn’t understand anything. I was shooting videos for companies and I turned to being a director because I couldn’t get a job as an actor. I wanted to direct, direct. And my wife saw how that was making my head too hot, creating a lot of anxiety because I couldn’t make those dreams come true. She made me see that the path of acting was easier. Because I wanted to be a director, I went bankrupt and had to change unions.
He invested his own money.
-There were a few months in which I had no clients. Being self-employed I was left without a penny. I worked in a friend’s bakery delivering cakes. I understood that the dream was over. I saw myself on the ground. Then the opportunity arose to direct a short film in India. I changed my representative and jobs began to come out. I had to hit rock bottom to get back up. And throughout this process my wife has supported me.
-Who is going to dedicate the Goya?
–To my mother and my father, who has already passed away.