Issue No. 595
Culture
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18 - 24 July 2002 Issue No. 595 Culture |
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In progress: Dramatic range
Youssra is a leading Egyptian film actress. She has starred in numerous films including Al-Muhagir (The Emigrant), Iskindiriya Kaman wa Kaman (Alexandrie Encore et Toujours), Al-Ra'i wal-Nisaa (The Shepherd and the Women) Al-Irhab wal-Kabab (Terrorism and Kebab), Al-Mansi (The Forgotten One), Dantella (Lace), Nazwa (Caprice). She has also appeared in six television dramas: Anf wa Thalath 'Uyun (A Nose and Three Eyes), Wuguh 'Ariyah (Naked Faces), Raafat Al-Haggan, Sayidat Al-Funduq (Lady of the Hotel), Hayat Al- Gohari and Awan Al-Ward (Time of Roses). Last year she released a tape with songs from the soundtracks of her movies and other singles. She has appeared in commercials to raise funds for the Children's Cancer Hospital. Well, right now I'm shooting here at Studio Nahhas. We've been working on this television drama written by Magdi Saber, Ayna Qalbi (Where is My Heart?), for three months in a row now. It is directed by Magdi Abu Emeira and produced by the Media Production City. And I'm really enjoying it. I haven't done many television dramas during my career, only six and this is the seventh -- so that's relatively little. I don't do many television dramas intentionally; I feel that you have to be a welcome guest when you enter peoples' homes through television. They should wait for you and want you to visit. So one shouldn't overdo it through television.
My role here is very different from that in the last series, Awan Al- Ward (Time of Roses), and even from the wife and mother I played in Hayat Al-Gohari. Here I'm playing a widow, a mother of two teenage children, a boy and a girl. The series deals with family relationships across different generations. This mother is an architect at the municipality. Abla Kamel is playing my best friend. As a widow I am the one supporting the family, until a man, played by Mahmoud Qabil, comes into the picture and indirectly begins supporting them. He is an important businessman and he sponsors the son who is a karate champion. This mother is different from Hayat El-Gohari; she comes from a different family and class background, upper-middle class, more modern, she used to be better off financially but no longer so. As her children grow up she shoulders more responsibilities and demands. She's a classy woman but she doesn't buy new clothes for herself, for example, she lives for her children. She is the stereotypical mother who always puts her children first. Today's scene has me in hospital which is why the makeup I have on makes me look sick and tired.
There are many young actors with us on this series: May Ezzeddin, Menna Shalabi, Haytham Abu Emeira. I really enjoy working with young actors. May, for example, I find to have a great potential. She really wants to learn and to be a professional. She takes our remarks seriously. And she's a spontaneous actress so that often she doesn't need to go over her lines repeatedly, she's one of the best I've worked with. Haytham, too, is very good, but he's young and he needs to concentrate. He's going to be one of the best of his generation, I think. And he knows when he's done a good job and when he's done a so-so job. He and May, both playing my children on the series, both love me and respect me. When we finished shooting the last scene on the set of the family home May actually cried; we honestly feel like family on this show.
The series is in 30 episodes and has 50 different sets. Imagine! It's supposed to run next Ramadan. It takes a lot of energy and time; I stay here shooting from noon to midnight every day, it's quite exhausting. One set, that of the family home, took six weeks of shooting.
These days I'm not working on the shooting as much as before because the play I'm working on has also begun its summer season. So I have to leave here in the evening to go to the theatre. I usually don't work on two things at the same time, but this series is very long and we didn't finish shooting before the beginning of the season.
I love the theatre and find my current play, Lamma Baba Yinam (When Dad Falls Asleep), very satisfying. I am full. I don't feel bored of it at all. I always used to think I could never go on stage every day and repeat the same lines. But when you actually do that in a successful project it makes a difference. The success of this play makes me very proud of it. And everyday the mood is different and so we play our roles differently. And the audience changes and so our reaction to the audience and our performance changes. So it's not the same thing every day, not at all.
As for cinema, I have a film coming up, Kalam Fil-Hobb (Love Talk). It will be directed by Ali Idris and star Hisham Selim, Hanan Turk and Amr Waked. We might start shooting in September. Here I will be playing a divorced waitress. So again it's a different role for me. She's someone living a very mundane routine life and then suddenly her life turns pink! And suddenly she's very happy. It's written by Zeinab Aziz and produced by Sami El-Adl.
These are the three projects I'm working on right now. I want to finish them before embarking on anything else.
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