Candela Peña: "I see myself as 'divi' and everything is very strong"

Candela Peña (Gavà, Barcelona, ​​1973) has her feet on the ground. She says it and it looks like it. And, not for that, she stops enjoying a great moment like the one she is now living. After having seen how La boda de rosa gave her her seventh nomination for a Goya Award (Candela has won three so far) and uncovered herself as a luxury guest on a millennial show like La Resistencia, now the second season is about to premiere from the series Hierro (Movistar+), in which she plays a judge whose problems accumulate.

Candela Peña is one of the most important actresses in recent Spanish cinema (All about my mother, Torremolinos 73, Princesses, A pistol in each hand, Kiki, love is made...) and she keeps calm and analyzes everything what happens around you with humor. "With everything they tell me I look cute and I think I should have shot for a model," she says with a laugh, to finish off with "I look divi and everything is very strong."

Do you feel that so many compliments can make you levitate?

Well, they hit me hard... I'm like La Concha beach. I know exactly when the tide is high and when it is low. I, at low tide, have survived all my life. When it's high I don't even have a surfboard... (laughs)

But she has always been treated well by the media...

I put myself in the girl I was. And I don't want to tell milongas to the girls. I am older than María Martillo and now they say 'Candela is breaking it'... But, mery, if I started with this at 18 in Numbered Days! How is the pot going to go now?

And how do you rate all this with new Iron chapters about to be released?

I know where my place is. I know that Hierro has taken me out of the pits. Until now I had not done television. What I'm glad about is that my platform is doing 'blessed glory' with my small contribution. That behind this series there is a team of 400 people and the actors almost never name us in the companies for which we work. I am a tool at the service of what others want to tell.

In these years you will have seen people who went up and others who stayed behind.

Do you know what's up? That we only work 8 percent of my profession. I am very aware that I started at the age of 16 studying acting with many people who have fallen by the wayside. And that, today, they are not actors, but they do work in a bank, in an herbalist, in a dance group...

IRON: ONE ISLAND, A THOUSAND PROBLEMS

In the new chapters of Iron (premiere on Movistar + on February 19) Candela Peña once again puts herself in the shoes of judge Candela Montes. A character who goes through difficulties due to the illness of her son and the appearance of a father (Matias Varela, Narcos series) who fights with very bad arts for the custody of her daughters. As if that were not enough, Diaz (Darío Grandinetti), a businessman from the island of El Hierro linked to the underworld, crosses paths with Candela again. Although Díaz is now collaborating with the judge, that guy's dark past continues to cause problems on the island.

"In this second season, the judge continues to be just as uncomfortable for the system. And, although she is the same and only a few months have passed, now she is more alone and angry about something that happened in the first season. All that sadness and sorrow shows in the way she is," summarizes the actress about her participation in a production that has given her a lot of joy. "I love my character and, above all, that it is not supported by the plot thanks to a man. I think that Candela has to make us think. As a rule, the boys write, produce and direct. And, within the masculine imaginary, you you participate in that imaginary while you are fresh and beautiful for the man. And, when you stop being so, around 40, you appear angry or pissed off. And the reality is that women should appear in the scripts wanting to live, calves and with joy ".

Regarding the adjectives that some media have used to refer to her at certain times, Candela Peña asks that "people who express her opinion not be branded as problematic." And that, in the case of women, do not say that they are "strong or middle-aged." "I never read those adjectives applied to boys in the media," says the actress.

"The press has a lot of responsibility in that sense, putting labels. I'm just an actress. Period. And I have been educated by a woman who has wanted me to give my opinion because she has not been allowed to give it at home," clarifies Candela Peña . "If they have allowed me to speak at home, let the world not call me a problem for saying what I think. I simply give my opinion. And it is worth nothing. But it is mine and I do not want them to give me adjectives for giving it. That girls are questioned about many things and something like that doesn't happen to men."

SURPRISES IN THE RESISTANCE

When talking about her hilarious appearances in La Resistencia, the Catalan actress is honest: "Now I have reached many people that I didn't reach before. Since I started going to an entertainment program like La Resistencia (Movistar+), the People see my puzzled face for being so amazed at what's going on there. But it's me. It's me talking about what's being said at the time. I think I've changed a lot of people's mental models and they don't see me as 'that pseudo-stale actress' that I thought I could be. So now I've reached out to more people."

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