When you are on stage, one can tell that you have very strong concentration skills. Is that typical during rehearsals too?
I guess it is, most of the time. But occasionally I do lose my concentration.
Don?t you need even more attention for singing?
You need to pay attention in a different way. I really miss going to special singing lessons and on top of that, smoking is not good for my voice.
How much time do you spend developing your spoken sound? Is it common to do such a thing at all?
It obviously depends on the role. If a character is really close to my personality, then I don?t need to deal with that aspect so much. But my current role differs from it quite a lot.
Does that mean you will have a tougher job?
Not really tougher, just different from most of my roles. When Béla Pintér writes texts, he takes the actors as the starting point. As a result, it is unavoidable that there will be something in the role from what he sees in us. But this time I quite enjoy that this character is not so obvious to me. It is not a big and complex role but it is quite different from the ones I played in the past.
Was that intentional?
Perhaps yes.
Does that mean that one can ask such a thing from him?
No. He writes a play that interests him and then he sometimes asks our opinion and in certain cases he could change things around if he thinks a part did not work in the first place. But we cannot just take out one role from the whole and do whatever we please with it. For instance we cannot turn a small role into a big one ? with various ideas. It is Béla Pintér who makes the decisions about changes to the finished play during the rehearsals and not the actors. But everyone can react to a role with their temperament, for instance I usually tell him my impressions.
You originally had a contract in the Vígszínház and have transferred from a traditional theatre to an independent one. Did you think about this decision seriously?
Yes, I used to work there for several years. I had some good tasks but sometimes I felt that despite having a fixed salary, a personal changing room and other comforts, I missed a different type of inspiration. I felt I could not keep my form the way I wanted it, and I didn?t have enough self-confidence, which is vitally important in this profession. It was no use that I participated in some excellent performances that were perfect in a professional sense and dared to take risks, the audiences did not really understand them because they did not expect such performances. It was of course a situation in which someone might want to stay in or they might want to quit.
The obvious question that arises is: what is theatre and what role does it have in society?
My decision offered an answer to this question. An independent troupe, I thought and still maintain, can function as a theatre for certain groups in society. It exists on the verge, with financial uncertainties but it is more important to the audience, or I could even say it is vital for them.
Still, don?t you sometimes think it would be nice to have a changing room and the rest?
First of all, it is important to me to do something that I believe in. Béla Pintér?s theatre is such a thing, so I?m in the right place. Additionally, most Hungarian theatres are increasingly petrified in tradition and there is less and less manoeuvring space. But I cannot complain considering that I had a chance to participate in very different projects every season which has been really refreshing.
But won?t you play Irina or Nora, just to mention a few roles?
I?m not saying I cannot imagine playing such roles from time to time. But next to working with Béla, I have outside jobs and sometimes the classics may also come in, such as Shakespeare, or at least in traces of it. Variety is always good. It would be interesting to cooperate with other co-productions and other troupes but it is not common in our field. Perhaps actors tend to make friends across the scene more often than directors and heads of theatres.
So your new role is rather different from past ones.
I play a countess, the mother of the protagonist. A mild-mannered and intelligent character.
Does that really differ from your own character? Aren?t you just like that?
My past roles showed me as a more combatant and tougher character, at least in Béla Pintér?s view. And I am indeed rather outspoken, I do not keep my opinion under wraps. I think he knows this aspect of me better and that?s why he writes such roles for me. But this new role is certainly different from that conflict-ridden character that I usually appear in.
So this is an orderly and elegant woman, just like a traditional actress. I don?t think that will differ from your own character that much, either.
Well, if what you mean is my character in real life? I don?t know, I?m always very surprised when I am recognised. But it happens quite rarely.
Interviewer: Lilla Proics / Photo: Bence Kovács
