La redazione di Wonderyou ha avuto il piacere di intervistare Odessa Rae, produttrice americana vincitrice del 95° Academy Award come Miglior Documentario per Navalny, ospite d’eccezione alla decima edizione del MIA 2024 – Mercato Internazionale Audiovisivo che si è svolto a Roma dal 14 al 18 ottobre 2024. E’ stata protagonista il 17 ottobre nella Sala 6 del Cinema Barberini di un Talk da titolo “Odessa Rae: Unveiling Truth And Inspiring Change”.
1.What did you learn from making a documentary film?
Teamwork is crucial. Make space for creative collaboration.
2.What feelings did it leave you with? Are they different from what the film scene can give you?
Self reflection. I am left feeling like nothing is ever finished. On Navalny the film ended but the campaign to keep him alive continued. On Hollywoodgate the film ends but the living conditions in Afghanistan, especially for women continues getting worse and worse.
3.The most difficult character you have played?
I was in a movie called Hard Candy. In one of the scenes, I have to enter the shot and discover my dead husband. Finding all the emotion that one would feel upon discovering a dead loved one was incredibly difficult at that time. I was young and still in a lot of denial and numbness.
4.How easy and/or complex is it for you to step into the bones of the main subject?
Hard. It’s a great challenge to try and see things from a different perspective. It’s a daily exercise.
5. Did you have to use any special filming equipment in certain scenes?
Sometimes the scene needs to be captured in the least intrusive way using a small handheld camera and a lone rode mic on the table. Sometimes we have the liberty to light a scene and have 4 cameras!
6. What difficulties did you encounter in shooting “Navalny”?
Haha. Where do I start ?
7.Where did the idea for this creation come from?
We (meaning Daniel Roher and I) were in Ukraine filming another documentary with Christo Grozev from Bellingcat. It was about a Ukrainian spy operation that was aiming to capture 32 Wagner Fighters. During this time, Navalny had been poisoned. We were following the news and when we realized that Christo was investigating the poisoning, we asked him to arrange a meeting for us. This meeting took place in the Black Forest in German, where Navalny was recuperating. We rented a car in Vienna and drove 9 hours into the little town where he was staying and didn’t leave.
8. How do you manage to get in and out of playing a role ?
It’s very difficult. I’ve feel a lot of compassion for actors who have major acting careers and play characters for many months. I think it takes a lot of detoxing. Everyone has their own process. I meditate.
