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Someone once told me that theater directors are nothing but professional audiences; in the same way, I think teachers are only experienced students who share their experiences with others.
Interview by Andrés García Barrios
A star’s career is full of learnings. None emerge and remain still in their first shining. Fernanda Castillo‘s life is like that, continuously learning and constantly being put to the test. She decided on her profession in childhood, and she already has numerous films, plays (such as the famous Hoy no me puedo levantar, in which she was the protagonist), and television series, one of which definitively threw her into the arms of the public. Her versatility and continuous personal growth carry her from light comedy to action thrillers and from there to the denunciation of violence against women. Undoubtedly, this singular delivery has brought her the public’s love (in 2018, she was the highest-grossing actress of national cinema) and numerous nominations and awards (Silver Goddess, Best Actress from the National Chamber of the Film Industry, among others). Her talent and gift of Star are combined with an unconventional sensitivity and commitment to human problems (look at her endearing appearance in the TED Talks lecture series).
Do you remember your first day of school at CEA, TELEVISA’s acting school?
Of course, I remember it! I was full of expectations, desire, and fear. I was 17 years old and could devote myself, at last, to what I loved most. But, I remember that I was also angry. The CEA was not the school I had wanted to enter. Before I had tried with UTC, the University Theater Center of UNAM, the most prestigious university academy in the country. However, they did not accept me because I was very young (I was so urged to study acting that I had left high school to do it in the open system and reduce time). So that first day at the CEA, I was angry, thinking that the training they would give me was not what I had dreamed. I was committed to being a serious actress, and I had the prejudice that I would not find this training in the CEA. How surprised I was to find myself in a center that offered excellent education, and I had to work ten hours a day or more! A school in which, in the three years of my degree, I found only commitment, discipline, and super-prepared teachers!
You mentioned that you were afraid.
Yes, of course, fear we all have when starting a career, I suppose; in my case, fear of not being a good actress. I thought, “I chose this career because I feel it is my life, but what if I’m lousy? What if I “suck” at this? The truth is, I didn’t know, I still do not, what other career path I could have followed.
There is a question that many of us ask ourselves: if one is going to dedicate oneself to acting, do all those previous studies in elementary, middle, and high school serve any purpose?
In the theatrical world, we joke that “I could have spared myself the differential calculus; I have not applied it in any work!” However, in effect, it is only a joke. All the learning in school helps you grow, so your brain works differently; it helps you live. In addition, those first steps are very fertile material for storytelling. Indeed, I do not use differential calculus in my career, but its traces have helped me understand life better.
Many pedagogues insist on the importance of play in education. When one thinks of acting schools, one imagines that students spend all their time playing and having fun. Is that true?
Without a doubt, in acting, it is indispensable to play and have fun. But knowing that does not mean one applies it. For many years I was very “square.” I believed that there was a regimen, a technique that led to perfection. It was the only path I saw in front of me. I did not have fun; I didn’t play. However, the passing years and finding myself with actors who enjoyed it much more than I taught me that your performance falls flat if you stand on a stage and are not having fun. And I am sure this does not happen anymore in my career! Without pleasure, any activity will become boring. I have had to break my molds to feel more and more alive.
“Going to school helps you grow. Your brain works differently, helps you live. Those first steps are fertile material when it comes to storytelling.”
Do you remember any particular moment in this process of losing your fear?
One day, during filming, I had to portray a girl helping a friend fix up hours before her wedding. They are in front of the mirror, and the bride – the other actress – already has her combed. Everything was going perfectly. I, of course, always thinking that “there is only one way to tell a scene,” imagined that things would happen in a cloud of illusion and beauty. So when the word “Action!” boomed, that actress started jumping on the bed, very excited, and all the pre-set schemes in my head were broken: “No!”I thought. “How can a bride be jumping on the bed? It’s obvious that you don’t want the hair to come all undone!” Over the next two seconds, thousands of “It shouldn’t be like that” flashed through my mind as I watched the actress enjoying herself and extending her hand for me to get on the bed with her. Then I had to decide: Do I stay down from that foolishness because that is not how things are done, or do I play the game of this different bride who decided to jump with such emotion on her wedding day, even if she was already combed. I chose the latter. And the scene worked very well! In life, you can’t sit still halfway, fixed to what you had planned because, who knows for what reason, you imagined that it was the right thing to do! One thinks that the perfect, the controlled, is the most “beautiful,” but more exciting nuances are often found in chaos.
There is a phrase: “If you try to control everything, you lose control.”
Yes, that fits a lot with what happened to me. You will understand. I not only had an actress’ vision but also a kind of director’s vision; that is, at the same time that I was in a scene, I tried to be outside it, seeing how things happened. Over the years, one learns something that applies in life: ride the wave as it comes.
So, unlike many people, you have had to learn how to mess up.
Haha, that is the way it is. All my childhood, until I entered acting school, I received dance education, where discipline, order, and perseverance worked very well. It was my comfort zone; order sets your limits, tells you where to go. In it, there is no subjectivity.
What did your teachers tell you about your perfecti
onism, that terror of arriving disheveled at your wedding with Art?
Look, undoubtedly, my teachers encouraged me to play, but sometimes one’s head is full of ideas that do not allow you to listen, and it is until later – with maturity and practice – that you begin to hear, to turn outward and quiet the voices inside. I imagine that they encouraged me to play at school, but surely I did only what was necessary to comply. My perfectionism would not have allowed me to risk much.
What other things have you been learning?
I spent the first ten years of my career being very shy, believing very little in myself. I used it as a pretext to project myself as an actress, and I would have to “sell myself” to an industry in which I did not believe much (although the truth is that I did not know it). Then a unique project came into my life, the character of Monica Robles, in the series El señor de los cielos (The Lord of the Skies). Monica forced me to feel sexy, beautiful, powerful, owner of her circumstances. I had to create all that for myself for the first time, and I did it through acting. (That character became very famous and came to be quoted a lot on Hispanic television in the United States. They made memes of her; some people repeated her sayings without knowing the program). Then I learned that if I could create that in a scene, it was because it was inside me that I had that strength, that claw; above all, I had the power to see myself differently and bring it to life. That happens with the different characters: you see inside yourself, learn about the human condition, and visit many facets of yourself.
“Telling stories transforms human beings.”
And the reverse? How do you bring what you learn in life to the scene?
In this, there are two essential points. On the one hand, one always applies things from their own lives on stage. However, there is a kind of trap here, and you have to be careful. It happens to me, and I have heard of other actors also. Sometimes, when something happens to you in real life, a director suddenly appears in your little head, telling you, “You may have to act something like what is happening to you, so remember this moment to use it on stage.” No, you cannot “consciously train” yourself in life. However, it is one thing not to train yourself consciously and another to understand that in life, everything is connected. That is the other important point I want to make. As an actress or actor, all the time, you are nourishing yourself, nurturing that kind of bomb of experiences that comprise you: a bomb of new ideas, new emotions. I, for example, am enjoying my baby a lot. With him, I stop thinking about going on stage. Also, I have been learning many things by his side (for example, I understand moms better now). Of course, it is not that Isay, “This is for when I act like a mom,” but surely one day I will bring to the scene what I am living. There are not two ways of life for me, but constant and very personal contact with everything around me.
Continuing with this joining of realities gives the impression that in your case and other celebrities, there is a kind of double profession: on the one hand, actress, and, on the other hand, public figure. Is there any training to perform the second, or is it something that has to be self-taught?
Yes, in effect, it is a double profession, and, yes, haha, there should be courses to cope with it. When I was studying acting, there was no such thing. I don’t know if now, it is taught how to function as a public figure in some schools. In the past, part of the magic was seeing actors on stage and not knowing anything about their personal lives. Nowadays, with social media, that’s impossible. Social networks have their advantages, of course, such as bringing you closer to the people who follow you, informing them of your past or future projects, inspiring them about things that have nothing to do with the scene. However, the problem is that today there is more hunger to know about every second of the actor’s personal life than his work. Therefore, one must have very clear limits as a person and a character and make them very clear to the public. I have learned to be very honest with people about who I am, what I want to share, and what I don’t. But sometimes all of this gets so complicated that I think, yes, someone should guide you somehow in this thing of being a public figure, haha.
The acting tradition is perhaps as old as the human being. The “masters” in this art date back to legendary times. How do you live being heir to such a critical vocation?
Storytelling is something that transforms human beings. Belonging to that tradition fills me with honor, but it also makes me feel very responsible, so much so that I live my career as a mission in life. When others hear your voice, they open their brains and souls to what you say, and they may begin to understand the world from your perspective. This honor deserves delivery; it deserves that you always live the performance as the dream intended for you from the beginning.
Translation by Daniel Wetta.
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This article from Observatory of the Institute for the Future of Education may be shared under the terms of the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 
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