- Her maxim of life: "But where danger is, grows the saving power also."
- [on the possibility of playing a Bond girl] If it's a stupid blonde in a bikini then I wouldn't be interested, but if it's an interesting character being mean, or something like Javier Bardem played, that could be good.
- [on playing Christian Petzold's movie heroines] Some characteristics might have something to do with me, but I haven't built up this defensive wall as many as the characters have to in Christian's movies. We also do that to create tension. If they don't have a problem you wouldn't be interested in them. It doesn't mean I never have problems but I would deal with them differently. I'm much lighter than his characters.
- [on working with the American cast of A Most Wanted Man (2014)] I don't consider myself to be lacking in confidence, but the confidence they have is so natural and no one is afraid of anything. It's just there and you work together.
- [on Gold (2013)] It's much more about the path, the journey, than big shoot-outs, or whatever else you consider to be in a classic Western. Of course revenge is a motive, and there are other elements in the film that you find in a typical Western, but the plot is more like an adventure, or a road-movie with horses, maybe.
- [on Western movies] I love the John Ford movies, which I first saw when I was still a kid. But I watched one recently that I hadn't seen before, which is Monte Hellman's The Shooting (1966), which is really an incredible Western because it's so simple in terms of the story and even the way it is shot, but extremely effective - I loved it!
- [on becoming an actress] My focus was primarily on the stage. I always wanted to be on the stage, even when I was 5. I still remember singing on the stage for the first time. I knew that if I sang, danced or acted, it would be on the stage. Throughout my childhood, every Sunday, I was allowed to watch Hollywood movies starring Katharine Hepburn, Bette Davis, Ingrid Bergman... That's what I grew up on. I enjoyed French cinema, too. I was always attracted to those kinds of movies, but never thought I would be in films myself. It all happened by accident. I wanted to focus on my stage work because it was something that I felt the most passionate about. I was in my first big film when I was 19, but I still went to acting school. The film was very successful in Germany. When I finished acting school, I split my time doing both theater and films.
- [on how she prepared for Barbara (2012)] I read many books about this time period by big German authors that lived in East Germany. Then we talked a lot and I asked a lot of questions. I have two friends that are from the east. I perform in a former East Berlin theater, so we have people from that generation who were born at the beginning of the GDR and experienced that whole thing. It was important for me to get that atmosphere right. Coming from the west, I never experienced it really. How does it feel when you're not allowed to talk? Every minute, you're paranoid that someone's listening in. Someone could just grab you on the street and say, "I want you to work for me." I wanted to understand how that must feel. How do people as humans try to escape something like that and make their lives seem worthy? How do you maintain your dignity? That's basically what Barbara is doing. In the end, she has an option that she never had. The doctor shows her how to live in silence and make the most of her circumstance. Isn't that maybe more fulfilling than the freedom you seek in the west? I certainly don't have the answer. It's a tricky thing. The sentimental side of me wants to believe that it's possible. That's the big question the film asks at its core.
- [making a comparison between film and TV] I think the way you get to learn your character is different in theater and film. In theater, you're in a collective and in this group, you discuss a lot, explore things, and when you go the wrong path you turn around and try something else. You're always together with your colleagues and in constant discourse. You're never on your own. You can make mistakes, but no one will see it and it doesn't matter. It's so beautiful doing theater because you really find yourself as an actress. I can try things without anyone judging me. You can't do that with films because you simply don't have the time. You have to be prepared and sometimes it can be a lonely process before you get onto the set. Another fascinating thing is that you get magical moments when a director calls "Action!" and you have all the freedom in the world. You shoot a scene and you might lose control, but then we have it forever. In theater, you have to play out the same story for 4 weeks and keep finding those moments over and over again. You're constantly asking, "How did I get there?" but in film, you get it right once and never have to do it again. It's an amazing thing.
- [on her collaborations with Christian Petzold] When we first met, I was just 22 years old. I was immediately interested in the way he saw things. He was the first director, especially since I was so young back then, who taught me so much about filmmaking. That's what I wanted to learn. Still to this day, I love being in the editing room and I like seeing the whole process of making a film beginning to end. I'm still learning a lot about it. He was the first one who didn't think, "Actors don't have a clue about that." We found a working language that worked for both of us very quickly. Since we've worked together for so long, we trust each other 100% of the time. If I criticize anything or he criticizes anything, it comes from a good place and you're doing it for the benefit of the other person. You're not trying to be nasty. It's a big thing that you're able to trust each other so much. I love the way he approaches filmmaking. There aren't many auteurs around anymore. He writes all of his own movies, thinks about them very deeply and creates a protective environment for his actors. Everyone is very responsible in their respective departments on his films. It's a very special way of working.
- [on playing the title role in Barbara (2012)] I had to fully understand her backstory. You see her and you can sense that she has this wall built up and nothing can get to her. I thought that she was once a very lively and positive woman. She had loved her job and something happened, which has a lot to with guilt. That's the story I had in my mind about her. I pushed her to the point where she can't do it any longer and she is forced to make a change. She comes to the point where she says, "I won't allow you to break me no matter what you do to me." That's how she finds her dignity. A good example is the use of her makeup. That came out of a story that my mother told me. When she was young in the '50s, she always wore makeup. In school, her teacher would take an eraser to wipe the board and tell my mother to wipe her makeup off in front of the whole class. She did just that and went to the bathroom and put it back on. I wanted Barbara to wear makeup. It was unusual in those days, in the countryside, to wear makeup. It's the kind of thing that would make people say, "Who does she think she is?"
- [on Devid Striesow] I always thought he was a great talent. Especially a comic talent. I think a comedian can be a tragic actor, and I see both things in him.
- [on the movies she watched to prepare for Barbara (2012)] Christian [Petzold] and Hans Fromm thought that, because the film is about the state observing the people, the camera should not be at an observing angle. The camera should be a friend of Barbara. When she's on her own in the bathroom, I never have the feeling that the way we look at her is threatening. The audience is never in the voyeuristic position. That was very important for me to know. We talk about that by watching movies. We watched The French Connection, for example, where you never see the shooter. It's about perspective. That tells a story in itself. Then we watched Howard Hawks's To Have and Have Not (1944): that is about a flirtation that is going on. [Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall] are quite harsh to each other, and very clever. And because they can handle each other, they are attracted to each other. The other person won't crumble. We watched that also just to watch a great movie.
- [on Stromboli (1950)] It's about being foreign, her being on that island. There's always a struggle. I always have the feeling that the characters Christian [Petzold] creates are similar in that sense. Either they were thrown out of society, or something happened like in Wolfsburg (2003) where a kid died and you're thrown out of it. It's always about, in a sense, how to get back in, to find their position. And how much do you have to give up of yourself to be a part of something? And don't you need to be part of something to be a fulfilled person?
- [on playing the title role in A Woman in Berlin (2008)] She is a very complex character. She is sensitive and vulnerable at the same time, but her actions display a huge amount of courage and self-awareness... It's exactly this combination of courage and vulnerability that stirred my interest in the character. I tried to show the deep wounds she had suffered, but also to show the hard shell she puts on to protect herself, and her acts of courage. She's someone who takes risks, someone who, for example, walks through that crowd of Russian soldiers and asks to see their commander, a situation where anybody else would have died from fear.
- [on Philip Seymour Hoffman] I must say I admire him as an actor and he was very exciting to work with.
- Politicians can try to act but it doesn't always work.
- [on the importance of stage work] I cannot yet let go of theater, although it's very tiring. Theater is like taking alternative routes when going [down] the road. So when I play in a movie, I can think of all these routes, before being open toward everything provided by the director.
- [on playing opposite Philip Seymour Hoffman in A Most Wanted Man (2014)] God, what an intelligent man! Our relationship in the movie is like an old, married couple's without being in the relationship at all, but we really care for each other. He made sure that I was able to put that across.
- [on playing the leading role in Phoenix (2014)] Nelly is so complicated, I had to simplify the process of playing a woman playing herself for myself first.
- As a German, when you talk about [the Holocaust] you have a very big responsibility of telling it in the right way and being very careful with how you tell it because it happened in our country. We want to make everyone aware that it happened in our country. The Germans have to tell the stories again and again and again because it happened here. Every time there is any anti-Semitism in Germany there is a huge outcry, because we need to make sure that it is never going to happen again, that it is impossible.
- [on her physical acting in Phoenix (2014)] I thought very much about how I could express her journey in her body. When you see the pictures of the people who were at Auschwitz or the other concentration camps, they are so thin and in a way not really there. They look like they don't want to be seen, so they don't get into trouble. That's what I was working on, the fear. I also wanted to show how [Nelly] grows slowly over time, like a flower. Her head goes up and she can remember what it is like to be in the body again. I wanted to embrace that and play with that and feel what it is.
- As a kid, I remember crying and then noticing myself in the mirror and being fascinated by how that looked. Now my antennae are always up. You see things on the street, the way people behave. It's not as cold as 'I can use that.' It's more like, 'Ah! Why would someone be like that? How must it feel?'
- [on her partnership with Christian Petzold, 2015 interview] We challenge each other. And I love his characters. They're women who fall out of life and have to fight their way back. There is pain but there's always something hopeful.
- [on being cast in Homeland (2011)] I love my character in Homeland, every time I get the scripts I'm so curious to learn what's going to happen to her next, she has this great humor to her and I love that. I don't think she's a normal spy, so I enjoy doing it so much.
- [on shooting Return to Montauk (2017)] Colm [Tóibín] writes women figures to die for. His script is so clever because my figure is, at first, the projection of the author but eventually slips out and becomes independent in a long monologue - very unusual in a film, and a big chance for me.
- Like all over the world, arthouse cinema in Germany has a tough time because people don't go to cinemas anymore like they used to. Also, subsidies go more and more into 'children's' films that are going to bring the money back. It's as if they don't want to do grown-up cinema anymore. So sometimes you have to wait two, three, four years at the moment for a project to get off the ground while the filmmaker gets the money together. I do believe that it is like theatre, that these things come and go in waves. I feel hopeful there will be a wave that will put us up again. You only need to look at what is going on in France and Eastern Europe where they are making fantastic films like Hungary's Son of Saul [Son of Saul (2015)].
- [on acting in her native German as opposed to a foreign language] Because it's my mother tongue, German, I would say, is the language that I have to think about the least. If someone says something to you, you immediately feel something. It's, let's say, deeper. In English, I feel very much at home now, but I still always translate everything beforehand, to have felt it once. [I want to understand] what it would do when I hear what the person is saying in German. Because there's always a little distance between the language and you. Even though you're good in it. But on the other hand, [working in another language] gives me an interesting freedom, because I can't control it completely. I don't know about all the movements that you do, even in English. I decide how I will say it, but I don't know if it comes across exactly as I intended, and it doesn't matter. That's interesting to me about performing in a different language, and French is the same. I enjoy it. Also, you will learn about another culture. You have to think about that. Where does this language come from? You're surrounded by people from another culture: in Homeland (2011), I was surrounded by Americans, and with Gold (2013), I was in Canada with Canadians. It does something to you and your acting. I just love that aspect of the job.
- [on mother Heidemarie Rohwedder She was actually the second female head of theater in Germany. My mother had to struggle more than Lydia [the Lydia Tár character in Tár (2022)] did being a woman in this position; I clearly experienced that with her as a child. But it taught me how to navigate things. What I learned through watching her is, in this job, never take it personally. The business, that's a game - you can't take that personally at all.
- [on Cate Blanchett] I feel huge admiration for the craft that Cate has, and the person that she is. She's incredibly intelligent, a human being with immense intuition, heart, generosity, risk-taking, and all these things I respect so much.
- [on Todd Field] I was just noticing that I am dealing with someone who is so precise in everything, he was looking for so much nuance, someone who has done his work and has researched everything... But he's so freeing and isn't clinging to the script, and yet at the same time knows exactly what he's looking for, and when he's got it. To be in someone's vision who is like that, it was just an incredible experience.
- [drawing a comparison between herself and her Tár (2022) co-star Cate Blanchett] She did 'Hedda Gabler' and I did 'Hedda Gabler'. Funny enough, she did the most German play, ['Big and Little'], and I did the same - I loved her in it, and the way she talked about it when I read interviews, I said, 'There's something in common the way we see our work and what we're interested in.
- [on the prospects of an American film career] It is new, and that's what is exciting about it. I'm also very aware I'm European, and not British, so there are only particular stories that are fitting, so to speak. But I'm just enjoying it more and more. I get more and more relaxed about playing in English. It's a different starting point. It's like, yeah, okay, I'm a fan of French cinema, but I grew up with American cinema. To be able to have a little dip into that and to keep on working in this world, and it's just really a dream for me, truly a dream. People like Todd Field. It's so rich. I feel so-all these references, I am part of cinema culture, and it's just amazing. I'm so humbled by it. I really want to give it a shot. But next year, for example, I'm going to do a French film and I'm going to work in Germany-no question, I'm not all of a sudden leaving everything behind.
- [on meeting Cate Blanchett for the first time] I know every film she was in, but I never assumed that she [knew mine]. That's just how it is. You're in Europe, you do another body of work. Maybe she had seen one film or whatever. I met her because we were both working in Budapest at the same time on different projects, beginning spring 2021. We knew that in autumn, we were going to work together. I thought she might not even know what I look like. And then she comes down the aisle, and I'm like, uh, should I say hello? Then she goes, "Nina!" And I'm like, oh, OK, she knows me. So that was the initial thing. We had dinners, which was really nice, to be in this exile we were all in, in this hotel where we were all in quarantine, really, to get to know each other on a personal level without any workaround. Then we had an opportunity to rehearse quite a bit with the orchestra and in Berlin, where we went through all the scenes in our house, so that we really knew who these two are and how they interact and what they are about.
- [on her character in Tár (2022)] She doesn't know everything. She doesn't know what's going on in New York. That's why she has a heart problem. There are certain mechanics in the relationship that were already in the script, clearly there, and you can decide what to enhance or not. Is it innocent? I don't think what Sharon does is innocent, but I don't think she knows everything because it's also unimaginable what's happening.
- [on taking on challenging projects such as Tár (2022)] It's the greatest. Of course you want to make it all so rich and with so many layers so that people want to watch a film again and again, and find different things that I'm maybe even not aware of. When you watch the film, you will see a different film. What kind of experience do you bring with you to see the film? Some will hate Lydia, some will love her, some will want to protect her. It has to do with yourself, in the point where this film picks you up from. Those are the films I am interested in, the films I really love-where I know, I myself can watch it and go, "Last time, I didn't even notice that, what the hell?" You can get surprised. It's not safe. We need to explore more. We need to listen more. We need to talk more. Have a conversation without the pre-judgment. Tat's what cinema is. Asking questions more than giving answers. And yeah, that's the fascinating thing in my work-what I am looking for.
- [on getting cast in Tár (2022) by Todd Field] He gave me the script and he said, "Whatever you feel, tell me, because I'm not finished with Sharon." Because the point of focus was of course Lydia, everything was there for her. But I thought there were little moments and things that you could tweak in the scenes where I knew I would have a better chance to position Sharon in a stronger way, in a more exciting way. He was super open and collaborative. We sat down in a café in Berlin. He was writing down all these things, the ideas we had. It was about the last scene, yes. But we went through all the scenes and then checked where I could squeeze out some more detail for Sharon. Yeah, that is something I do. That's when I thrive. You've just got to push in and put your standpoint there and try to make it work.
- [on her acting dynamics with Tár (2022) co-star Cate Blanchett] [Cate and I] have a similar-without putting me on [her] level-way of approaching this job. The intensity she's working with, and relentless search for every little detail in the character you're portraying, really to the moment of pure exhaustion. On top of it, she's the most lovely person. It made it very easy to dance together.
- [on her approach to characters] When I was younger, I would write a lot. I would prepare the biography. And that's all very good. And some still do it. But I had an experience once where I saw [someone's script and] every sentence had 1,000 other sentences written around it. And I thought, "Oh my god, I'm not prepared". And then, once we were on set, nothing happened. I was just like, Where is everything that I thought that [this character] was? How do I feel it? And so I thought, yeah, that's not the essence for me. For me, mainly, I prepare with the book, which gives me the questions that I have, like why would she react like this here? I do have to know where each character comes from. What is their family situation? If you don't see them with friends, is that a problem? Or is that just because [the story takes place over] three days, and that's not an issue? These things are what forms a character, potentially, so that I understand where her reactions come from at every moment. If I don't understand that, I need to construct something for me so that then, when I'm on set, I can forget it all again. When I meet the directors and other actors, I'm letting everything go and seeing what's actually going on and reacting to it. I prep by watching films. I watch documentaries. I look at other actors' work that inspires me. Everything is inspiring in the moment of preparation.
- [on her approach to the Sharon character in Tár (2022)] Who are we all around people that are geniuses, or special in a certain way? You lead an institution that has a certain system in itself, where people fall into that system and make their way through, that's what they know. They want you to be a certain way, otherwise they won't respect you. Do you actually have a chance to do things differently, even though everyone else demands it from you? Sharon is part of that.
- [on My Little Sister (2020) directors Stéphanie Chuat and Véronique Reymond] I saw The Little Bedroom (2010). What I loved about it is that they have the guts, the strength, and the bravery to let air in. They allow moments where everything comes to a rest and you can reflect. We don't explain everything that's going on. I saw that they are looking for the lightness in a melodramatic story. I think that's incredibly important, because it makes it so real. Because you can't control life. And they observe that so well. The way they use the camera is they follow the actor. They're not always close; they give room. It's all the things that I enjoyed in this movie where I thought, "Okay then, I know how to read the script, because I understand how they will probably film it.
- [on shaping her movie characters] The physicality, for me, always comes from, is this a person who has a guard up? Is she very loose and free? Is she flirty? Or is she very, "I would like to, but I can't." That immediately does something to your body. And the way someone walks: Is it confident? The shoes! I did this film, Pelican Blood (2019), where she is in this western kind of scenario. So this person can't walk. Lisa [in My Little Sister (2020)] would walk in little heels. These shoes do everything. You're more grounded. It's about other things, too. Your femininity is another one. That helps for where the voice sets. It depends. I don't want to have too many ideas. Because then they're sometimes in your way. You try to fulfill these ideas, but then you're not open for what's actually going on. I try to feel it out. That's my joy.
- [on being directed by Ina Weisse in The Audition (2019)] When Ina sets up the scene, if she's not content and even if she can't find immediately the point where it is, she's searching until we find it, and there's just a very concentrated point of view, which I couldn't really say this comes from her being an actress, but she knows what atmosphere is needed that you can come to this point of concentration and to trust that this is enough. And maybe if [Ina] sees someone is nervous and pulls out their little trick, she finds another way. She doesn't go, ""But this is how it needs to be." It's "Okay. Let's work with this," and from the back door, she finds another entrance to what she wants." If she knows the scene is a highly emotional one, [and an actor] needs their space, I always had the feeling she knows exactly where everyone is and she can pick us up from there. So maybe it has to do with this experience.
- [on her violin-playing in The Audition (2019)] That was my goal, to get there, so that people would actually believe that I have a connection to this instrument. But no, I do play the piano, so I know how to read music and all that, but I have never played the violin ... well, that's not true, as I did, once, a movie, years ago, where I actually learned with the same teacher who then turned out to be a friend of Ina's. So I worked again with her. She has a great technique; she works a lot with refugee kids from Syria. She doesn't focus so much on knowing the notes, but is more intuitive. And that's what helped me so much for Anna. I felt that, yes, this instrument is very different from the piano, because it is a part of you: you feel the wood, everything is very sensual, you kind of have to feel where the sound is. You have to be somehow open to play this instrument, to produce the perfect tone. And if you're not, you won't get there. And that, to me, was Anna. If you're too nervous, if you're too tense, if you're too undecided...like in the restaurant with her food, she wants everything at the same time! And nothing's right. She's also somewhat egotistical: she needs an affair, she has it, but doesn't go too far because she loves her husband. But she's such an interesting character to me, and I could explore her through working on this violin.
- [on approaching her role in The Audition (2019)] Knowing life and how complex people can be, there are so many different things, things you don't allow yourself to be, or things you wish you could be but can't and all that, and that intrigued me. Talking to Ina [Weisse] about it and finding that we were both looking for this subtleness, I immediately trusted her. She is my regulator, she is the one who sees this in me and I need to trust her. I felt very quickly that her eye is very precise, and what she looks for, and I know this sounds stupid, is realness. Something real has to happen, and that is what I look for too. I need to experience something in the moment, and I don't need to consciously think I'm acting. As soon as the camera rolls, let's see what happens. You have prepared everything, but at that moment let's just jam, let's see what the others do. And she managed to work with us in such a way that this jamming worked. She follows a very narrow, concentrated path, and that was for me very fruitful. I wanted you to understand Anna, the character. Her harshness, her unfairness, that you get where that comes from. I hope that as an audience you go, "I recognize that." That's what makes you cling to it, your surprise at the violence, the sadness, or the craziness that is in you. And to balance that, that is my work. That is what is in the film, a character is out of balance.
- [on her character in The Audition (2019)] I was immediately intrigued by [it] because I really like if I don't understand someone immediately, so I thought, "What is this with the woman?" I could relate to being very disciplined as a musician, and that's what you ask from your pupils as well. But on the other hand, she keeps on talking about [how] you have to imagine the sound before you produce it - it's all up to who you are as a person and what you want to express in your music and to be able to do that, you've just got to be able to work like crazy to have the technical part down. That's intertwined with a personality, and you put layer after layer out and discover who she is, because she doesn't know in the moment of time. It also shifts from light moments with the husband, and the marriage is a good one - they love each other, but she needs something else in this moment of time and she just takes it, which is also very confident and surprising. I could also relate to that [where] you're in your forties and you say, "Is this it now? Is this my path?" Or friends that I have that have a huge dream and then in the middle of your lifetime, you go, "Okay, maybe I'm actually happy with not having achieved it, but maybe you're not. Maybe you hold yourself back because you put too much pressure on everything you do. All of these things I found in Anna and [they were] so intriguing.
- [on her character's progression in The Audition (2019)] A woman has many different sides. Sometimes we don't even know what shoes to wear! There are so many personalities within yourself. It starts with someone who looks for a unique sound, not just perfect technique. There is something special in that moment that is very beautiful, it opens the room up and you see this wonderful teacher. But then when she doesn't succeed she goes back to what she knows: work, practice, shunning feeling. In moments of insecurity you always go back to old patterns. She punishes herself. I found it beautiful that she starts off as someone who is looking for something other than perfection.
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