‘Dragon Tattoo’ star Noomi Rapace transforms into ‘Mother’ Teresa for provocative biopic

‘Dragon Tattoo’ star Noomi Rapace transforms into ‘Mother’ Teresa for provocative biopic

[Music] [Applause] Hello and thanks for joining us today on Arts 24. We welcome an actress who broke through globally in 2009 with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and has since starred in Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, Guy Rich’s Sherlock Holmes, A Game of Shadows, and the Icelandic folk horror lamb. She’s now taking on one of her most radical transformations yet. Mother Theresa in Mother, Tiona Struggar Mateka’s punk rock refraraming of the 20th century St. Numei Rapus. Welcome. Thank you. It’s a pleasure to have you. Happy to be here. Now, Mother, it’s not a reverential biopic. It’s raw. It’s pro provocative. It’s deeply intimate. You’ve played so many um psychologically demanding characters over the years. Um Elizabeth Salander, Daisy Diamond, and the mother in Lamb. Yeah. Why Mother Theresa? O I mean it was funny when I asked Tiona, my wonderful director. I was like, “Why me?” And she was like, “Cuz I saw you in Millennium.” So I think it was very much Lisper that kind of brought her to to come to me cuz she also um they have something in common. They’re both quite rebellious. They’re very strong. They fight for something. they fight for women. Um, and I think the the the Mother Teresa I discovered when I was digging and deep diving into her was a a human with a lot of internal struggles and a lot of she carried a lot of pain. Um, and it was quite surprising to discover how that he was not a straight line for her. You know, she was doubting herself. She was suffocating, suffering and had a lot of um dark periods in her life. She said once, “If I will ever become a saint, it will surely be one of darkness.” Well, the film focuses on seven days in 1948 when Mother Theresa was waiting for permission to leave the convent filled with doubt, ambition, and spiritual frustration. Let’s take a look at you playing Mother Theresa, a mother. Only a few times sisters were allowed to leave and start their own order. Who will replace you? Sister. Good morning, mother. You will inspire thousands of others to save millions and millions of lives. The letter arrived. Thank you. I will also have to leave. There is no reason for you to leave. I’m pregnant. I fell in love. Love? What do you know about love? Now, Nimi, you are often described as badass. It’s not a new word for you. Ever since um Elizabeth Salander um and then in characters like the astronaut in constellation or the scientist in Prometheus who performs surgery on herself, then carries on fighting. Your mother trees, she’s incredibly strong. She’s uncompromising. Do you seek out these characters or do they find you? Well, I think they find me. Um, but I I’m drawn to characters that have has sort of a complexion, an internal battle that are struggling that it’s not sort of I find it more interesting to be in the shadows and the cracks, the human cracks sort of. Um, and we all have have it, you know, it’s not easy to be a human. And you prepared for this role for something like six months, but you were simultaneously working on two other films. Uh, The End of It and Hotspot. The End of It was after. Okay. Yeah. Hotspot um is a crazy project. Um I saw it in LA a couple of weeks ago. It’s I’m really proud of it, too. And these were three female directors. So you filmed last year with three female directors. Surely that must be quite a unique experience. That’s quite rare, isn’t it? Yeah. I I feel so blessed. and three fantastic female filmmakers, but they happens to be females. Like, um, so how often do we say, “Oh, how is it to work with with this amazing male director?” Just the fact that we use the term female directors, like I think we should pass that now. But we have to cuz it’s still very unusual and it’s, you know, it’s not many out there. We need more female directors. And these three are forces of natures. And it was just a blessing being on set with these three remarkable directors. Well, your mother, Theresa, is a feminist. Let’s take a look at a scene showing her frustration with the patriarchy. You can do anything. Me, I’m trapped in here in this prison, comfortably waiting for the world to change. I’m a woman in a system run by men. Men like you. Men, men, men. Look at these walls. Huh? What are these walls for? What are we scared of? Is this an absence of faith? I feel. Yes, maybe. Is that a crime? I wonder sometimes running this comment is not enough anymore. It’s tiring and pointless. So, we see this very strong Mother Theresa who’s also doubting. Um, it doesn’t shy away from controversy though in the film, including Mother Theresa’s opposition to abortion and her long periods of spiritual doubt. Um, did you and the team talk about how religious communities might react to the film and have you had any reaction? I’m waiting for them. Um, that was sort of the hardest thing for me to understand with Mother Teresa, her stand on abortion cuz me, most people around me, you know, in the Western world and where I’m from, you know, abortion is, you know, absolute sort of it’s a no-brainer. You know, of course, a woman has the right to her own body and her own choice and but looking at America, for example, now I was shooting a movie in in New Orleans a couple of years ago and they just changed the laws and half of the female crew was crying one day and they were like, “We just lost the rights to our bodies and I was like, what are you talking about?” Um, and then so sort of deep diving into the aspect of that and try to understand the stand of that. Um that was like the hardest thing but I could also see it from her perspective you know in the deeper I went into her that every child is a gift from God but um I mean re religion she is a fanatic in many ways and she is and I what I really what was what I was drawn to in this project is that we are exploring her doubt and that she goes too far. She’s too hard on Agneska um that she deeply loves but she treats her really quite she’s brutal and then she realizes that’s the character who is a nun who falls pregnant. Exactly. And that also mother has a love for that is maybe crossing the line a little bit. Um we don’t really know what kind of love it is. Is it sister love or is it some sort of romantic love? We’re kind of exploring the different colors of love in that relationship. But um but I love that there’s a moment when she comes, Teresa comes and says, “I’m sorry, you know, I’m sorry for my brutality and for how I treated you.” Um and I mean, she’s she’s this big sort of boss lady. She’s a CEO for a huge, you know, organization and she had to have that sort of black and white belief system, I think, to reach where she where she was heading and what she wanted to achieve. But also within that there’s a room for self-doubt and to ask for forgiveness. We are coming to the end of the show. I want to quickly ask you about filming in Kolkata because you actually filmed on the streets where Mother Teresa walked back in 1948. Yes. What was that like? Oh, it was incredible. Very brutal. It was intense. We shot knights. We shot in the slums. And to be honest, like I was really shocked by the poverty. Like obviously I knew, but it hasn’t changed much. And then coming back to London to my house and just like the contrast and the life we’re living here, it’s so far from the reality for so many people. And the work of Mother Teresa, there’s a lot of people criticizing her on this side of the world, but there they have the deepest love and respect for her. And that was really beautiful to hear and to experience and to we were filming in the school that she started and to see all these little girls. They came up and greeted me like mother mother and I was just like it was quite um it’s it was a really special shoot. It took me to a lot of places in myself. The last week on set was really um I feel like I kind of there’s a scene where I cut my hair off and it felt like I was letting go of the last piece of myself in a strange way. But it was very emotional and not cutting the hair but the journey of letting um Teresa live in me. But um I’m very grateful for this experience and I’m very excited for the movie to come out in France. Just before we go I want to ask you one thing because we are here in France. Your surname Rapas. Yes. In French it means Bird of Prey. Yes. Which obviously you know um you chose that name. Yeah. When you got married many years ago. Many divorced. Many years ago. What do you think of that name now? Why did you choose it? Well, I I I always been very um sort of drawn to those birds, those big birds. They’re monogamous. They’re very protective of their own. Like, they’re beautiful. They’re powerful. Um and I was young and, you know, really romantic. Um and then, you know, when I divorced, I was like, “Ah, what am I going to do with the name?” You know, kind of felt a bit. Um but then my son said one morning when I was shooting Prometheus, we’re sitting in this house in Hammersmith in London. My son is eating his cereals and he’s like, “Mommy, do you know that I’m the firstb born rap pass in the world?” And I was like, “Wow.” Yeah. Cuz there’s no others with that surname. No, I don’t think so. Cuz it’s not really a name, is it? But um and then it all made sense, you know. I kind of wanted to start my own sort of an own like a chapter and um take ownership sort of over my my name. And my son is very proud over the name and he’s the firstborn rapas and I think he was the reason. It’s beautiful. And we’re going to play out now with Lily Allen’s new album, West End Girl. I know that you’re a fan of it. You were at the launch party. Um why do you think it’s resonating so much with people? Cuz it’s honest. It’s very um brave. It’s directly from her. She she recorded it in two weeks. It was really um it’s such a it’s unpolished, it’s direct, it’s an urgency. Um and also, you know, she tells her story about a very painful and horrible sort of breakup and discovery that the person you thought was something was something else maybe. And I think a lot of people can relate to that. Um and it’s just an amazing piece of art. The album is incredible. I’ve been listening to it like a lot and like singing along and like forcing my friends to listen. Listen to this. Do you listen to this frame like right here? This piece of the lyrics. I think it’s really she’s an amazing artist. It resonated with so many women all over the world, didn’t it? Um new rappers. Thank you so much for joining us. It’s been a pleasure to have you on the show. We’re going to leave you then with West End Girl. Mother is in cinemas in France from December the 3rd. Thank you for watching. See you next time. [Music] here. We’ve moved to New York. We found a nice little rental near a sweet little school. Now I’m looking at houses with four or five floors. And you found us a brown stone. Said you want it, it’s yours. So we went ahead and we bought it. Found ourselves a good mortgage. Then he come [Music] a pushing it forward. Made me feel a bit awkward.

From Lisbeth Salander to Mother Teresa, Noomi Rapace has never shied away from transformative, fearless roles. In her latest film “Mother”, directed by Teona Strugar Mitevska, the Swedish actress takes on one of her most radical characters yet: a young Mother Teresa in 1948, on the brink of leaving the convent to follow her calling. But this is no reverential biopic. “Mother” is raw, provocative, and intimate – a “punk rock” portrait that demystifies the saint and reveals the ambitious, conflicted woman beneath.
#NoomiRapace #Mother #Teresa

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