Rodrigo Gil has been underestimated many times in his short career. Although he tries to cure it, it is the only real trauma he has. Especially the suffering he experienced during his student days “extremely” bothers him, but he is not addicted to it. So much so that when he got bored of recording the telenovela ‘Los Hijos de Pandora’, he felt the need to leave Cuba for a while to “reconnect with school”.
Nights in Madrid have fueled her bohemian air, and she now studies acting there. You can see a lot of hippie behavior and he’s happy. He tries to be “enough” for himself, “not for others.” After suspending his studies at the Higher Institute of Art in Havana, he is preparing “fully” because “better things are to come and I hope to be back on the air in Spain soon.”
At just 23 years old and with over 84,000 followers on Instagram, the young actor is developing his “flow” with the skill of two or three shots and four or five jobs. “One cannot be trusted,” he says. “If you have more talents, thank God and work, because there will always be someone better than you,” he says with the charm of someone who handles the discourse well, before picking up the threads of this conversation.
What has changed for you as an actor since you played Saul in ‘The Face of the Days’ to Radel in ‘The Children of Pandora’?
-Many things have changed, because even though ‘El Rostro de los Dias’ came out in 2020, I started recording it in 2018. And Radel at the end of 2022, which means almost four years have passed. Four years in which the pandemic brought many new experiences into my life. In a way, my acting style has become more mature, putting the experiences you have throughout your life on stage.
– What does it mean for the public to react to your interpretation as an actor?
– Being an actor is what excites me the most. It is that people are not passive spectators. When you watch television or go to the movies, you want to live what the character is and feel identified, or at least feel like you’re judging what you’re watching. You wonder “Why does he do that?” If the public does that with one of my characters, that’s a sign that something has been done right there.
– You realize that you are very egotistical and like to be the center of attention. So, what would you say is the center of your being?
– I am a very selfish person and this is something I have considered. It’s not something I’m trying to change, but control, so it’s not the center of my life. However, I became an actor and besides falling in love, I loved how I felt when the audience applauded me for the first time in the theater. Beyond that, I think it’s beneficial to humanity, the people around me, the environment in some way, and it’s more than just entertainment, it’s like being a voice of conscience. Not someone who tells you how you should be in your real life, but shows you a man who can be like you and represent all the values you embrace or all you reject. But, one way or another, it makes you think. That’s what interests me: to make people think, to enjoy themselves in what I do, to have a good time, but, at the same time, to think about what’s most important in life. If you don’t think, you’re dead.
-What’s the best and worst thing about being the center of attention?
– For me, the best thing is that you are not noticed. And what’s worse is that there’s always someone questioning you, something you’ll have to learn to deal with.
-You have said that talent is an easy thing to waste. How did you use yours?
– I don’t consider myself a super talented actor, but I do consider myself a hard worker. And what I think about it, it works. If you’re born with the best physical fitness for the sport, you start running as a kid, you’re the fastest in the group, but if you don’t train daily, maybe someone who isn’t so fast trains twice as much as you. and develops his muscles much better, and can accomplish much more and faster than you, even though he may not have the same natural talent.
-You said an actor should have heartaches, if not, find them. What did you find?
– I don’t have much, but I always go to the class of Professor Carlos Díaz, who told me that you can move forward in life and get out of your comfort zone. I don’t come from a dysfunctional family, one grows up in existential crises. One should seek them without being a slave to them, so that they always support me in my life. They always supported me in everything that came into my head, but they gave me the freedom to be wrong. My shock is understated.
What are the main limitations for an actor in Cuba today?
This is the most difficult question you have ever asked me. I think the chances are slim, because if there’s so much variety that one can choose from, sometimes you just pigeonhole yourself and end up doing the same thing. However, although I have not had a long career, thank God I have been able to do different things on television. But I am very interested in making films and I don’t get a chance to do it, I think it is not because of lack of talent but because of lack of productions. Usually a director chooses actors with whom he has already worked. So it’s a chain and they want to risk the project they’ve worked so hard on and everybody’s struggling because there’s no money, and it’s not just the directors and the actors, it’s not the producers. .
Sometimes that’s why they go without even casting. It limits opportunities for others. I hope a director reading this will call me. I love to make movies because I know it’s a blessing to transform an actor. I knew I would become an actor when his magic came to me because it was a different job and I was crazy to immerse myself in that experience. I know very talented and hard-working actors who, so to speak, haven’t been able to kick the can, not because they weren’t looking for it, but because it just hasn’t happened yet. It is very difficult to see what is going on.
And, financially, when you work on a series you can’t just live on what it gives you. You have to look for other alternative ways to make money because it doesn’t give you, it’s screwed. People don’t realize how complicated acting is. Sometimes the shooting schedules come out daily, not to come home and sleep after a 12-hour shoot, but to study and learn the script for the next day. Or they pick you up at six in the morning even though your shows are at one in the afternoon because they don’t have enough petrol to make two trips.
Was becoming a model and influencer a necessity or just a hobby?
-It was something that happened alone, but it fed me and allowed me to act. I was able to live only from television or theater, but in networks I found a business opportunity and a certain level of comfort and the opportunity to meet people who identified with my work. Doing this from Cuba was complicated above all by currency fluctuations, which meant the money he received was less and less.
– To what extent do you think soap operas resemble Cuban reality?
It depends on the soap opera. I think ‘The Children of Pandora’ captured that very well. Now, this is a pre-pandemic novel. The soap opera in Cuba is recorded in 2023 and will be released in 2024 or 2025, and the public must take into account that a lot changes on the island in a year. In the end, you always show a part of reality. For example, in Brazilian soap operas, they give you the favela and the rest are luxurious establishments. But Brazil is not what those novels show you. Sometimes criticizing for the sake of criticizing is something that gives me courage. If a director wants to show you the most beautiful facade in Cuba, let him do it, because that’s subjective. Not all novels have to show you harsh reality.
– Why did you decide to live in Spain?
– To go back to study, I decided to change the scenery a little. It’s one of those crises I was talking about that makes you reinvent yourself all the time. I study acting at the Central Film School in Madrid. The Cuban School of Dramatic Art focuses on theater, although it also offers some television and other subjects. But being from Madrid is about learning to work for the camera, which I know how to do, is deeply embedded in my subconscious, but here I explore it. In addition, the work of a soap opera, for example, is exhausting. Although there were job opportunities in Cuba, I decided to stay away for a while because sometimes one has to detoxify a role so as not to repeat oneself.
Why do you think that what is done with full conscience and freedom “will never cause repentance”?
Because it’s something I’ve meditated on. It’s a sixth sense that tells you: “This is the way.” There are things you have to say yes or yes to and when you do them you know they are right. I’m Catholic, I believe in God, and if you don’t do something you know you should, the burden of conscience is terrible. No one can deny that. It is linked to your principles, your philosophy, your thoughts. You can never betray yourself because if you do, your life will fall apart.
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