Supporting actor Esteban Viaña

Esteban Viaña plays Javier, the former boss in the shop where Luis worked.  Luis lost his job because Javier, a somewhat older man, decided it was time to retire and he closed the shop.  This was right before the economic crisis;  Javier explains to Luis he had no idea there was going to be a crisis.  He closed his shop at just the right time out of pure luck.

The scenes with Esteban are an important part of the story of Domino:  Caught in the Crisis.  They not only explain why Luis is out of work, but they show how people who are favored by fate -- close their shop just in time, have the money to run a shop to begin with, etcetera, can be insensitive to those around them who do NOT have such good fortune.

Esteban Viaña as the former boss, Javier.

 
Viaña lives in Jerez de la Frontera, and began his acting career at a young age, when he was in grammar school and there was an activity called "Oration and Recitation."  He loved it, and has been hooked on acting ever since.  He has acted in dramas, religious plays, and many other sorts of productions but his favorites have always been plays directed towards children, for which he usually takes a comic role.

Esteban Viaña, yours truly and Antonio de la Malena...checking out the script.

The highlights of his acting career to date include the husband of the lead character in a play by Federico Garcia Lorca called The Prodigious Shoemaker (La zapatera prodigiousa) which was first produced in various smaller venues but later, brought to the main theater in Jerez de la Frontera (a theater with several thousand seats).

He also had a supporting role in a play by the famous Spanish playwright, Alfonso Pasos and more recently, was featured in a production of On this Island, There Are No Cats (En esta isla no hay gatos) presented by the theater company Tras el Trapo.  Tras el Trapo, you may remember, is a theater company co-owned and operated by Javier Padilla, which provided Domino with a number of actors.

Esteban Viaña as Publius Cornelius.

And just this past month, Viaña joined Domino actor Nicolas Montoya in a special production in the old Roman theater at Baelo Claudia (near Bolonia, on the Atlantic coast).  The play was an original work, written to bring to life the history of the ancient city.  Titled The Nights of Isis (Las noches de Isis), he played the role of Publius Cornelius, one of the two Roman governors of the region at the time that the city was an important Roman port and manufacturing center for the luxury article garum (made out of salted, dried fish).

The old Roman theater at Baelo Claudia (with the seats covered up--don´t know why).

And just to be sure he doesn´t get bored, currently, in addition to acting, Viaña has taken up a couple of musical instruments:  the saxophone and the accordion.

OUR NEXT POST will be about supporting actor Javier Padilla.

Interview with our star, part 2

This is part two of our interview with Antonio de la Malena, star of Domino:

Eve A. Ma (EM):  What scene did you like best, from the point of view of your interpretation? 

Antonio de la Malena (Malena):  There´s one scene with which I particularly identify.  It´s the scene in which I´m tearing up the lottery ticket, and the image of my face at that moment is like a mirror of my own life. 

EM:  What did you like best about the direction?  What least? 

Malena:  What I liked best is the director´s discipline.  I really liked that.  What I liked least is that I feel she needs more assistance, more assistance to be able to properly realize all of her creative projects.   It made me unhappy seeing she lacked that.  

Malena with actor Esteban Viaña and crew.

EM:  In thinking about the film itself, what part did you like best?  Do you think it fairly reflects the current situation in Spain?  

Malena:  In general, I liked everything about the film.  There aren´t things that I like best, and others that I like less well--because it was all done with the heart, and the soul, and with real sympathy for what is happening right now in Spain. 

EM:  What scene did you like best, from the point of view of your interpretation? 

Malena:  There´s one scene with which I particularly identify.  It´s the scene in which I´m tearing up the lottery ticket, and the image of my face at that moment is like a mirror of my own life. 

Malena with actors Jose Luis Martinez and Santiago Moreno.

EM:  What did you like best about the direction?  What least? 

Malena:  What I liked best is the director´s discipline.  I really liked that.  What I liked least is that I feel she needs more assistance, more assistance to be able to properly realize all of her creative projects.   It made me unhappy seeing she lacked that.  

EM:  In thinking about the film itself, what part did you like best?  Do you think it fairly reflects the current situation in Spain?  

Malena:  In general, I liked everything about the film.  There aren´t things that I like best, and others that I like less well--because it was all done with the heart, and the soul, and with real sympathy for what is happening right now in Spain. 

De la Malena with crew, director, actor Nicolas Montoya and others.

EM:  I understand that you had to shave off your beard several times because the director decided to add more scenes and to re-shoot others.  Now that you are free to grow your beard, have you done so?

Malena:  Well, yes, but it didn´t bother me to keep cutting my hair and shaving off my beard because the scenes were good ones and besides, I figured I was going to be earning more money.  

OUR NEXT POST will be about one of the supporting actors, Esteban Viaña.

Interview with our star Antonio de la Malena, part 1

Now that we´ve finished shooting Domino, I decided to interview our lead actor, Antonio de la Malena, to see what he thought about the whole process and the movie itself.  I´d planned to put it all here but since it´s a bit too long, I´ll break it up into two posts.  Here´s the first half -- unedited, but translated from Spanish.

Eve Ma (EM);   Now that the filming is done, what did you like most about playing your part?  And what least? 

Antonio de la Malena (de la Malena):  What I liked most is that I´m trying to adjust myself to the task of being an actor and I think that with the help of the director, I am able to do it and will be able to do it again, should the opportunity arise.  It´s very difficult, it´s not easy, but I try to put myself into the mind-set of the protagonist so that in my interpretation, my emotions are real, and appropriate. 

De la Malena in the scene in the pawn shop.

EM:  Since this was the first time you acted in front of a camera, how does it differ from your normal role of performing on stage? 

de la Malena:   Usually, when I´m performing on stage,there aren´t cameras that are filming you first in a close-up and then in a long shot.  There aren´t any cameras close up, in front of your face, and you don´t have to repeat everything so many times.

EM:  Did you feel well prepared to act before you started out?  Do you feel well prepared now, if you´re asked to do it again? 

de la Malena:   The truth is that you´re never really prepared.  It´s a kind of work that makes you feel embarrassed and is nerve-wracking when there are a lot of people around and you need to play the part of someone else, but the more you do it, the less stage-fright you get.  It´s one of those things that you have to get used to, little by little.  

De la Malena in the scene where he talks on the phone to his wife.

EM:   Did you feel any personal affinity with the character you played in Domino?  Why, or why not? 

de la Malena:  Yes, I put myself in the position of my character and there were moments in which it seemed so natural that I thought the character was actually my real self.

EM:  How did you feel, working with the other actors?

de la Malena:  It was a very nice experience, and I saw that everyone was learning from it. 

OUR NEXT POST with be the second half of this interview.

The actors

We used a wide variety of actors in Domino, from professionals who are appearing on prime-time TV to a ten year old girl with no experience acting and, to the best of my knowledge, no desire to become an actress.  Each one of them worked hard, each one presented different challenges for me, the director, and each one really did a good job.  Some, in fact, did an excellent job.

It was a great pleasure to work with Antonio de la Malena, our star.  He learned his roles, he took the time to "put himself into the character," and he never complained when I said, "Ok, that take was really good, now let´s do it again, just in case."

Antnio de la Malena, playing Luis, takes a break during the shooting.

I found it truly interesting that he put himself into his role...taking a few moments before each scene and usually before each take, to be in the correct emotional place.  The reason I found it so interesting is that he´d never acted before and certainly had never heard of Method Acting, or Stanislavsky.  On the other hand, flamenco singing (and he is a flamenco singer, a cantaor) requires exactly the same kind of emotional commitment, which is why I chose him to be the lead, in the first place.

Other actors I want to point out are Nicolas Montoya and Javier Padilla.  Both appeared in several scenes, both were very professional and very prepared, and both also helped me in other ways.  Nicolas Montoya (who is in the popular television program Bandoleras) found me an actor when I needed one, and also found the location for the bank scenes.

Nicolas Montoya plays Miguel the banker.

  Javier Padilla played two roles, one a small one but needing someone with good body control.  (He has a beard in that scene, a no beard in the other, so he looks like two different people.)  Javier also found at least three other actors for me.  Every time I called and said "I need someone of a certain age and capable of a certain type of role," he would find me that person...or rather, he´d give me several people for me to choose from.

This brings me back to our lead character.  Antonio de la Malena is, along with Javier Padilla, responsible for helping me with the casting.  He found more actors for me than I can count.  I haven´t been in Jerez long enough to "know everyone," and without him, and Javier Padilla (plus Nicolas Montoya), well, I don´t know if I´d have been able to produce Domino.

Other actors include Salvador Valle, Esteban Viaña, José María Martinez, Rosario Heredia and Luis de la Tota.  I enjoyed working with all of them.

Salvador Valle plays Salvador the neighbor, who offers Luis a few hours´ work.

 The last one I especially want to point out, however, is that 10 year old girl, Marta.  She is a bit shy, and certainly not used to memorizing lines, putting herself in character, or anything of the sort.  She was very willing, however, and like all the rest, she never complained (except once, and that was not a complaint but in the first shoot, she got exhausted and started crying.  We called it a day, and thought of ways to keep her from getting so worn out in future scenes.)

Marta, seen here with Antonio de la Malena, plays the daughter of Luis.

Domino is the first real narrative I´ve ever directed.  It has been a real learning experience.  One of the most pleasurable memories I´ll carry with me from it is these actors....  Thanks to you all.

OUR NEXT POST will be an interview with our lead actor, Antonio de la Malena.

Which is working best, California or Spain?

Well, I got back from Spain about three days ago.   The weather is gorgeous here in the San Francisco Bay Area.  A bit hot yesterday afternoon, but still, gorgeous.  The bay is beautiful.  The birds are singing.  The sun is shining.  All is right in the world, at least on this side of the Atlantic, right?

Marin headlands and the Golden Gate Bridge

Well….

Housing prices are going up again in the Bay Area.  Many people think this is good news.  “Many people” does not include those who’ve lost their homes, or people of modest incomes.  But we’ll let that one pass, and pretend it’s a good thing for everyone.

Some of California’s major cities have gone bankrupt.

What?  Bankrupt?

The lagoon near the Berkeley Marina.

 My own city, El Cerrito, is suing the State of California.  Why?  Because the State of California is demanding a huge chunk of money from it, money that came from the city’s redevelopment agency…and the State of California eliminated all city redevelopment agencies last year, and then said the cities could use the money remaining in the redevelopment accounts for other purposes, and the City of El Cerrito allocated these monies for other projects, and the State of California says that no, they’ve allocated too much and so need to return millions to the State of California, and, and, and…..

I have no view on the legal issues involved, since I don’t really KNOW the legal issues involved.

Why is the State of California requiring money from the cities?  (And this is absolutely not the first instance.)  Because the State of California is in dire financial straits.

So here I get back from Spain, which “everyone” considers to be a basket case, and I find…

…things in California aren’t going so well, either.

But it’s a beautiful day, and the bay looks gorgeous.

View of the bay from the hills.

 

I think I’ll go out for a walk.

OUR NEXT POST will be about the actors in Domino. 

No, I don't hate banks PLUS Music in film

I feel the need to explain that, in spite of my fumings and fulminations, I do NOT hate all banks and bankers.  I am acquainted with banks and bankers who are careful with the money other people have entrusted to them, and work hard to take good care of it.  That, in my view, is what banks and bankers are supposed to do, and it´s a useful thing.

But if you pour honey onto the sidewalk, you will soon find you have ants and flies where there had been no ants and no flies.  If you deregulate banks, you will attract loan sharks, along with people whose primary concern is personal profit, and people who believe the banks need to serve the investors rather than the customers and depositors.  These people managed to take over some of our largest financial institutions and are, in my opinion, the prime cause of the financial crisis.

And no, I do NOT like them.

NOW, on to music in film.

I guess everyone has experienced the music in movies where a sweet sound swells just as the handsome hero and beautiful heroine kiss passionately.  That, obviously, is one of the prime uses of music in film.  The music tells us we need to feel mushy, that we are viewing true love, and this is a great and glorious thing.

But there are other uses of music in film.

If you think about it, you realize that music in film came partly out of the silent film era, where music helped let the audience know what was going on and what emotions the audience was supposed to be feeling.

Now, with dialogue, you don´t need music to tell you so much.  In fact, it´s just as easy to get too much music in a film as too little.

I have been trying hard to pay attention to how music is used in the movies I watch, and learn as much as possible from watching and listening to how others do it.  In Phyllida Lloyd´s The Iron Lady, for example, music is used to tell us the movie is about to shift in time and even more often, to tell us that our Margaret Thatcher (played by Meryl Streep) is about to wander off into her past, or see her now-deceased husband as still living.

On the other hand, The Piano, a film by Jane Campton, uses music as the voice of our heroine.  It was fascinating to learn that the actress who played the lead role (Holly Hunter), actually learned how to play the piano as part of the preparation for playing her part.  We are not seeing her body swaying in front of a piano while someone else´s hands are running over the keys.  She is making her own music.

Dr. Zhivago, a very different kind of movie directed by David Lean (starring Omar Shariff), uses music in the more conventional way, to let the audience know that we are seeing true love, or that something very profound is about to take place.

I won´t continue on, but you might find it interesting, the next time you watch a movie, to see how music is used.

OUR NEXT POST will be about returning to California--which is working best, Spain or California?

Antonio de la Malena´s double disc of flamenco cante

The star of Domino is, by original profession, a flamenco cantaor/singer.  He has been singing professionally since he was nine years old, in public and private events in Jerez de la Frontera and making his television debut in Niños Cantaores (part of Rito y Geografía del Cante).  Yes, he was only 9 years old.

And although he has several CDs to his name (flamenco semi-fusion), plus is on lots of flamenco CDs which include several singers, he has never had a true flamenco CD of his own.

Well, we decided to change that.  We decided to change that because he is a very, very fine singer.  In addition, many people only know of his talents as a singer who provides the cante for dancers, and aren´t aware of the fact that he´s a great soloist as well.

The CD cover:  Antonio de la Malena with his father, el Morao.

When we started recording several months ago, the idea was to produce a CD with 10 cantes (flamenco songs).  The word on the street is that anything less than 10 tracks is not taken seriously.  But when Antonio sings, he keeps on singing.  The result is that some tracks were more than 10 minutes long, and the bottom line is that there was no way to put 10 tracks onto one CD.  You simply couldn´t fit them all in.

As a result, we recorded some more and are coming out with a double CD--two CDs in one package.  There are a total of 16 cantes in this package, 8 on each CD.  The title of the album is Para ti mi cante, que es mi libertad.  (I give my song to you, my song which is my freedom.)

The album is currently being manufactured, and when that process plus some legal details have been taken care of, we´ll have the album in our hands.  We´re talking about one week or so.  We´re hoping to release it at an event in southern France on June 30.  We don´t know if we can make this deadline or not, but we´re trying.

One way or another, if you live in Europe, once it is actually available, you will be able to purchase it on-line at the web site http://AntoniodelaMalenaCD.com.

Antonio de la Malena--photo:  Martin Guerrero y Casa Patas

  We´ll release it in the U.S. later, when we have solved a couple of other legal problems plus acquired enough money to pay for production in the U.S..

For flamenco buffs, the album starts with a trilla plus estribillo, the estribillo being something that Antonio wrote (both the music and the lyrics).  Other tracks include 3 seguiriyas, a soleá, a soleá por bulerías, a bulerías a golpe, a regular bulerías, a fin de fiesta, an alegrías, etc., etc..  Very compete.

Guitarists are Manuel Parilla, Domingo Rubichi, Malena Hijo and Santiago Moreno.

Antonio´s brother Manuel de Malena joins Antonio in the tarantos, with each of them singing a section.  And in the fin de fiesta plus the estribillos, other singers join in, such as David Carpio, el Nono del Periquin, etc.

I promise you, if you like flamenco, you´ll love this.  If you don´t know anything about flamenco, you still might well like it.  Antonio has a great voice, great pitch, and puts lots of emotion into his singing.

The official producer of the album is Palomino Productions.  Co-producers are Jerez Puro and el Rincón Andaluz.  We also have a partially completed, very simple web site for the album at http://AntoniodelaMalenaCDs,blogspot.com.

OUR NEXT POST will be about adding Domino´s last scenes, and the background music--end of a long road.