The assigned location corresponds to a traditional hotel located on Alvear Avenue. In a meeting room on the first floor, he waits Diego Peretti to chat with NEWS. Peretti transmits serenity, professionalism, good humor and a contagious predisposition for chatting. The excuse for the meeting is provided by the premiere of the second season of “The kingdom”whose episodes are already available on Netflix, where he shares the bill with Mercedes Morán, Peter Lanzani, Joaquín Furriel, Nancy Duplaá, among other prominent actors from the local scene, in a series created by Marcelo Piñeyro and Claudia Piñeiro.
From his extensive film career, titles such as “Time for the Brave”, “It’s not you, it’s me”, “Music on hold”, “Wakolda”, “Papers in the wind”, “Sin hijos” and “El robo del century”, “More respect than I am your mother”, among others. Actor and psychiatrist, from his outstanding theatrical work arise “Death of a Salesman”, “The Goodbye Girl”, “A Tram Named Desire”, “The Neighbors from Above”, and “Immature”, the work where he shares the bill with Adrián Suar since 2020, who hit records huge audience at the El Nacional theater for more than 250,000 spectators and which already has few performances left.
On television, Peretti’s list of projects is endless. “Los Simuladores”, “Culpables”, “Campeones de la vida”, “Locas de amor”, “El hombre que vuelvo de la muerte”, “Criminal”, “En terapia” and “Poliladron” make up a fictional map that shows fully the versatility of the interpreter both in daily strips, as unitaries and series. One of the most popular actors in Argentina, faces “The Wrath of God”, listens to “Ecos de un crimen” and clings to the promise of power that will allow him to be the definitive owner of “The Kingdom”.
News: Let’s start by talking about my friend Emilio Vázquez Pena. How is it done in this second season so that such a character doesn’t end up turning into a monster, into a cartoon?
Diego Peretti: I tell you that if he turned into a monster or a caricature it wouldn’t seem bad at all. Because in the series, Good and Evil are extreme if you assume them as a way of acting. In the case of Emilio, his world is absolute, there are no greys, especially since “El Reino” talks about how this man truly contacted the Messiah, with a miraculous boy, so all this situation interpreted from the sick logic of Emilio Vázquez Pena makes it a character unequivocally supported by Evil. That’s why it doesn’t bother me that a character who moves from such an absolutist place is underlined to the extreme.
News: How did you manage to get into Emilio’s head in his role as a president who lost any anchorage to reality?
Peretti: I really liked doing it because it has a madness that is based on a very singular logic, very well written and at the same time very lonely. Imagine, the psychosis or the perversion that he has in his Faith is corroborated and the guy exercises his power from his own world, totally disconnected from reality. Emilio is a lost satellite with no place to go beyond his madness.
News: Now we see him in “The Kingdom”, he was also in “The Wrath of God” and in “Echoes of a Crime”. Lately he has been touched by many incarnations of Evil, is it just a coincidence?
Peretti: You are right! (laughs) the truth is that it is pure coincidence, because I listen to you and it is true that in these four years I have been touched by characters linked to the metaphysical and power reflected in the figures of some writers and in this case a religious man. The life of the professional actor makes the characters have a unique path. Maybe you catch a streak of similarities and wonder why the writers thought of you at the same time for roles that have things in common. Now there are these allies of evil, but suddenly there are streaks of romantic comedies… You’re right in what you say and I like it, I’m happy with that.
News: With respect to power there is a common place, based on reality, that it corrupts whoever exercises it. From his character and also from Osorio, played by Joaquín Furriel, can we say that power not only corrupts but also makes people sick?
Peretti: Yes of course. To corrupt necessarily means to get sick, I totally agree.
News: When “El Reino” began, the parallelism with Jair Bolsonaro was inevitable, but speaking locally, do you feel that it reflects some phenomenon in Argentina, such as that of Javier Milei?
Peretti: Not just local. Because if I tell you that in a country people’s expectations cannot be met even remotely, a power vacuum is created and that space is occupied by an extremist leader., that happens in Siberia, in Uganda, in Kenya, in Brazil, in Argentina, in Chile, in the United States and that is what we are counting. It is something very international, transcends borders.
News: If we had to describe this moment in Argentina with a title from one of his films, would it be “The Reconstruction”, “Time for the Brave”, “The Bottom of the Sea” or “The Robbery of the Century”?
Peretti: “The theft of the century”. Between “The bottom of the sea” and “The robbery of the century” we are.
News: We are writing this note in March, just three years after the beginning of the quarantine due to the Covid 19 pandemic, as a psychiatrist, what do you think could be the psychic consequences of confinement and the feeling of vulnerability that we have experienced in recent years? ?
Peretti: It really does not reach my imagination and my knowledge to even outline a perspective. I know that the consequences are there, honestly I do not dare to categorize or order them, but I am convinced that this impact on mental health must be important, what happened was not common and that leaves traces.
News: Since we are at a Netflix press conference, I ask you, are you going to be part of “El Eternauta”?
Peretti: No, I don’t think so, I don’t know… But from what I understand it will be done and Ricardo Darín will be Juan Salvo. “El Eternauta” deserves a well-made and well-directed series.
News: The last time we spoke you were waiting for the script for “Los Simuladores”, has it arrived yet?
Peretti: You know that no! (laughs) Well, we’re still working on it, but it’s being written and we should receive it in approximately 20 days because the idea is to shoot in the second half of this year.
News: Going back to “El Reino”, in this season he has several scenes with his namesake Diego Velázquez (“Santa Evita”, “Entre hombres”), if Emilio Vázquez Pena were Perón, would he be José López Rega?
Peretti: Yes, it would be something similar, that association is inevitable.
News: From an acting point of view, does it change anything that this season has only six episodes? The first season had 14 episodes.
Peretti: No, it seems to me that the more synthesis is achieved, the better. I prefer a product to be compact, solid, not stretch it due to success, I think the story is very well told in six chapters. And I like that it ends in a second season, not that it frays into a fifth or sixth.
News: Let’s take stock, did this job make you happy? Did it leave you satisfied?
Peretti: Yes a lot! It is a very nice job, with talented people who worked to achieve the best in a fiction made in Argentina, we had the best resources at our disposal and we developed everything we wanted regarding the subject. I am happy to have tried without any obstacles to make the best possible series, that always fills me with good air.
News: In both seasons you had a tumultuous married life with Mercedes Morán, one of the best Argentine actresses. What was the experience of building that couple like?
Peretti: Very good! I have already worked with Mercedes several times, we know each other, we try not to lose the playful thing in the work, in the characterizations, to have a good time, to be very professional and want everything to turn out as well as possible, there is no neglect. I love that and added to the talent that she naturally has, it is very comfortable, in a good sense of the word, working together.
News: Very recently we lost María Onetto in very sad circumstances, you were colleagues on more than one occasion, how do you remember her?
Peretti: The truth is, it was all very sad. María was a friend, a great actress, a beautiful and very good person that she left. Maybe it doesn’t do much good to express that she was someone close to me and that I loved her very much, but I feel the need to say it.
by Leonardo Martinelli
