Basically when I read the material, I have to go through an experience. I have to not only think and imagine, but feel. Feel what I'm reading, feel the world they are trying to portray and describe in the script. If I have a real experience that makes me see that the material is good, then the audience is going to have that experience also. I'm no different from any human being or any person: if I feel it, people will feel it. Once I have that feeling I start to work with the director to see if we can make the character more realistic, more close to the audience, instead of a caricature. If that's possible, then I jump into the boat and we start to sail (laughing).
When you are thinking about doing a film does the size of the role matter to you?
No, not at all. But so far I've done mostly main characters because the secondary or supporting characters I've read have been pretty bad. It is not a matter of the quantity but the quality.
Does working for a big studio vs working for a little, independent studio ever enter your mind when you're selecting a project?
No. I'm from Spain, I live in Spain and we don't have major studios. I've been working for 10 years so I'm pretty used to what I like to do. I do a movie because I like it, I'm not paying attention to any surroundings, anything that surrounds that movie. Be it the studio, the publicity, merchandise, etc. I don't really care if it's independent or a big studio as long as the material is good. So far the material that I've been offered for big studios wasn't interesting for me at all. I think that the pretty good roles are always in independent movies where there's the most personal point of view. [There] are more deeply written kinds of characters because the writers are not actually obsessed about making everybody like their product. They are more free to construct, to imagine, and to create crazy people and characters.
Your critically acclaimed, award-winning film "Mondays in the Sun" will be opening soon in America. Will that story translate well into the American culture?
I truly think so. I went to the Sundance Film Festival and to Palm Springs. I went to five screenings of the movie. In all of the five screenings, they were stopped three times in the same place by the audience in order to applaud. It's an amazing movie. The reaction was the same in Spain, France, Italy, and England. People really get the message. They don't miss anything, even if it's Spanish. The message is so clear when it talks about human beings in hard conditions and how the irony helps you to go through those hard conditions. It's so universal that people don't really care if it's in Spanish or in Japanese or in Greek. The movie is so powerful. People stopped the thing three times to applaud. They were laughing a lot and at the same time they were crying. It's a whole experience, that movie.
