«NI can call it “randomness”. At the station library I was looking for a train novel and I chose The art of joy: I didn’t know him, I based myself on the cover aspect. Reading it I thought: this character is perfect for me! Two weeks later I received the invitation to participate in the audition ». The end is known (however obvious, and we will understand it later): Tecla Insolia was awarded the role of the protagonist in the series taken from the book of Goliarda Sapienza and directed by Valeria Golino (on Sky, and streaming on Now, from February 28).
“Fabulously controversial”
Modest is amoral, sexually casual, does not hesitate to exploit those who love her and even kill to reach her purposes … in what sense “perfect for her”?
It is fabulously controversial, and I love complexity: it moves on excesses, wrong and right, in the need for love and in the murder. He suffered violence from his father when he was a child but does not react – this is the most powerful thing! – Victimizing or perhaps developing the sense of guilt unfortunately common to several who have suffered rapes. No, she reacts taking her life in her hands to “write” her in her own way. The episodes, however, do not cover the whole story, stop at motherhood.
The most difficult aspects of the project?
Strange, I never let myself be carried away by its hardness and suffering, I kept the same lucidity that she has modest in what she commit, in what she suffers. In the nude scenes I was in a kind of absence of inhibitory brakes: I knew that I was protected, that Valeria’s gaze refuses vulgarity and has a natural predisposition to elegance.
Tecla Insolia (photo Maddalena Petrosino).
“Fluid model”
Perhaps his generation is freer towards a female model outside the box, fluid.
In fact, when I listened to the conversations between the two Valerie (Golino and Bruni Tedeschi, who impersonates Princess Brandiforti, editor’s note) who called a “unicum” modest, I wondered: “Why?”. But I am not the spokesman for my generation, I hate generalizing: “my generation” are also the boys – and the girls – who attacked two peers on Rome on New Year’s Eve in Rome, a stone’s throw from my house, because they were held by the hand. On closer inspection, the most difficult aspect for me was to convince me to have the qualities necessary for the part. Although I wanted it at any cost, even after the “no” received.
“I started at 14”
Didn’t it go smoothly, from the audience offer?
Well, there was a need to undergo four others … indeed, five! At the second meeting Valeria was sincere: “I don’t feel your body, and the character is all body” he explained to me, accompanying himself with a move. “Ah ok, this is the soul of the character. Understood! The next time we meet I will be able to make it. ” The use of hands, hips, head was essential. And of the shoulders … “Tienile open, communicate strength. Wake up, you have it! ‘ He repeated and, with the screenwriters, he called me “Miss Clavicola”.
Do you have a nerd approach, Tecla?
Diligent. (smiles) The first experiences on a set date back to when I was 14, I followed various courses that have accustomed me to rigor. Or – more likely – it is a matter of character.
His personal “art of joy”?
Be with who I love. Create (both a connection with someone, be to throw down a scribble or a thought). Discover, acquire knowledge. And above all – having a tendency not to suffering but to introspection, to a certain heaviness – it makes me happy to notice how many beautiful things surround me. Very small or important. The series was an unimaginable opportunity that now allows me to travel with the imagination by placing much less limits. It opened my heart a little, here.
For WhatsApp’s profile, however, he chose an ambiguous phrase, not superpositional: “great pessimism always implies great optimism”.
I don’t know who the author is, he resonated me. The acting – or singing or any artistic discipline – are wonderful weapons to transform what you feel (and which could even destroy you) into something bright for the public. They make your torment “accessible” so that a spectator can feel understood or simply get excited.
Tecla Insolia with Alma Noce in “The art of joy” (photo Paolo Ciriello/Sky Italia).
Tecla Insolia in Sanremo
His initial vocation was singing.
It seems that I sang before I spoke: I sang when I was sick, I sang when I was happy … my parents immediately believed in me: they sent me to lessons, they incurred not irrelevant expenses since they did not wallow in gold, with a shop of fixtures, in Piombino. Today I ask myself: “What the desire had they had to cross Italy from north to south to accompany me to competitions in remote villages?”.
It will not have been relaxing for her either.
As I am sick on the eve of an audition, I was sick on the eve of a performance, But you get used to it. Somehow I was already supporting a part: if I had been me – Tecla, that is, a wren – I would have collapsed. Instead I acquired strength, I learned to manage anxiety, the fears and to communicate them: when at seven years you are on a stage between strangers, you must defend yourself, you must protect yourself. And what strategy is it better to exploit what you feel to communicate, to move? Let alone in Sanremo!
A victory at the Sanremo Young competition in 2019, a second place among the new proposals at the 2020 Festival.
By now I feel a total detachment, as if it had happened to another. At the selections for Sanremo Young enrolled in my mother, I was not convinced, however when they led me for the selections I found it a nice opportunity. There were many aspirants who brought cheerful texts, I opted for The genius of the good of Mina … (shakes her head) My passion, without me realizing it, had turned into a profession and I felt an excessive responsibility.
Tecla Insolia and Michele Riondino in “Spring” by Damiano Michieletto (photo Kimberley Ross).
“I was Nada on TV”
In what sense?
As a new proposal I participated in the race with a song not suitable for my age: March 8thon violence against women. I find more freedom in being an actress. In a short time I went from a toxicoded assassin lover (in Tree by Sara Petraglia, in cinemas from March 20, editor’s note) and student who finds himself pregnant (in Ten days by Elisa Amoruso, editor’s note).
How was the leap from the notes to the screen?
Painless, it is an attitude I have inside: I remember that with my teacher I sang and interpreted together. I feel the music in acting, as I felt acting in music.
And the music follows her: she was launched by the TV movie on Nada, The little girl who didn’t want to singand it will soon be a violinist in Spring by Damiano Michieletto.
What job does it allow you to learn to play the violin in three months? I’m only sorry for my neighbors … (laughs) Cecilia, the protagonist, shares the rebellion with modest, the search for redemption that pushes to fight, not to surrender.
Speaking of indomitable women: is it called Tecla for Santa Tecla, the disciple of San Paolo who twice was saved from the martyrdom?
Mom wanted a particular name for me. He had three options: Tecla, Altea or avoid. As soon as he knew the name of the nurse who was accompanying her to the Travaglio room, Tecla … well …
Can we call it “randomness”?
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