Before we sit down for our interview in the kitchen of his apartment, Şerban Pavlu quickly ends the photo shoot and prepares some tea – an opportunity for me to look at the large library in his hallroom (which, I understand, hosts only a part of his literature collection), where, pleasantly surprised, I find titles like What is cinema? Volume I, by Andre Bazin, Notes on Cinematography by Robert Bresson, Montauk by Max Frisch and Kundera’s Joke.

Undoubtedly, Șerban Pavlu (b. 1975) is one of the most prominent contemporary Romanian actors, one of the hallmark faces of the New Romanian Cinema, with a prolific career both in the fields of theater (he is an employee of the Bulandra Theater in Bucharest) and in dubbing. For viewers of the small screen, his face is synonymous with that of gangster Relu Oncescu, the protagonist of the hit series Umbre/Shadows, whose third season recently had its premiere on HBO GO. For the big screen viewers, Șerban Pavlu is the fetish actor of Radu Jude (he is present in all his feature films, as well as in most of his short films) and of Andrei Kretzulescu (idem!), whose brilliant career in cinema took off over the course of the last three feature films of the late Lucian Pintilie: Terminus Paradis (1998), The Afternoon of a Torturer (2001) and Niki and Flo (2003).

On the occasion of the new season of Umbre, I spoke with Șerban about how he took on the role of Relu in a season that approaches the character in a very different way: apparently placed towards the margins of the storyline yet at the same time in its epicenter, with less lines (and even screentime) compared to the first two seasons. And I didn’t miss the opportunity to ask him a bit about his history with Romanian cinema.

I just marathoned season 3.

You did some binging?

Yes! I noticed a major difference in comparison to the rest of the seasons, especially regarding tonality – it is much darker.

I think it was wanted this way, since that is how the Umbre universe was defined: a dark and hopeless world. But it is definitely a stylistic decision. I enjoy it and I like it a lot when “pretentious” series have stylistic options that wholly define a visual universe, which belongs to the environment in which the characters evolve – it’s very cool. We have begun to think about the series in these terms. Whether we like it or not, this is commonplace: the big campaigns for fashion or perfume stores create a visual identity of their products.

Regarding the aesthetics of this season – I noticed that it eluded some obvious pitfalls for a story with Romanian gangsters. The influences here seemed to me closer to certain American series, such as The Sopranos.

That was a cool thing, but also a risk. When you pay tribute to a particular movie or series, there is a risk that you will be told that you are trying to just copy it and ended up doing a bad job. You wanted to make Casino, but Mamaia 96 came out. There is a risk that I think is an inheritance from the Romanian cinema of the eighties – that when you do a story about gangsters, you resort to theatricality, to clichés. I’m trying to remember the bad guys from the films in the nineties and they are all the same.

Well, those films didn’t really age well.

No, because it was a world that we were more or less imagining or copying. I recently watched some giallo films, and I realized that, ten years after these films, the Romanian crime films copied them! I don’t want to name titles, but if they had erotic elements, they were definitely going there.

This thing has always scared me, ever since Shadows started, ever since the first proposal. Obviously I enjoyed the proposal, the opportunity to work with HBO, but I said to myself, “God, Romanian cinema can sometimes be so cringy”. This is where my problem arose – not being the kind of man who is Relu, that is, a former sportsman, a great wrestler or a guy who grew up in gangs, I didn’t know anything about this world. And since cinema is theatre, and a dose of authenticity is recommended, I was scared! As I neared the end of the casting process and until I took the role, I kept thinking, „Oh god, what did I get myself into?”

The first season was actually an HBO franchise, right?

Yes, it was a remake of an Australian first season of the series. But that was just a dramaturgical scheme. It doesn’t make justice to just say that Bogdan Mirică adapted it – he went on the path imposed by that scheme, with the same characters, but located in our own national space. I saw a few episodes from that initial series, but it was not a success, it was a strange show – neither a horse, nor a donkey. It was canceled after the first season. But here, something funny happened with Shadows. It was a phenomenon.

I was wondering about the first season because the tone is getting darker, from season to season. The first is much more comedic, and the episodes are more or less self-contained.

It resembles that original series – it had both funny notes and soap opera notes, but also some action scenes that came suddenly. This was cool for me – I always liked Bogdan’s ironic side, his black humor, which is always present in the series and in the characters’ dialogues; they often even make fun of the situation they are in. Then there is a universe of the author himself, if I may say so – but this world, put together, works in the opposite direction: of real threat, of inner torment, of a permanent inner rumble, which is reflected at every level of the series, including the sound. It’s like David Lynch – you see some idyllic images and suddenly you hear this screeching sound.

There are many more suspense scenes this season, you’re using a much more psychological register. And this season, Relu (who is a very taciturn character) speaks the least of all seasons. I’m thinking here also of the little scandal related to the small number of lines Margot Robbie had in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, to which she responded very eloquently, saying that she doesn’t necessarily need many lines to play a character. So, keeping this in mind, how was the experience of this season?

Once you get close to Relu and his character, or at least what I imagine this character to be, as I feel it, he is not a guy that “runs his mouth”. Again, no matter how cliché this sounds, once you get into a character, you begin to feel its conventions and limits. And Relu is definitely not a man of words. When I happened to have longer parts to perform, I felt this sort of inadequacy, somehow. I started thinking about the reasons why this man would suddenly start talking so much, and that makes you look even deeper inside of his psychology. In season II he has that long monologue – when he tortures Nea Geamănu in that abandoned industrial hall – which is well written and fun to play, but he speaks a lot very suddenly! So I had to build an explanation for the fact that Relu suddenly has this deluge, why he’s preaching to this man, whom he is simultaneously torturing.

So, I was comfortable with this smaller measure in season III – it’s not only that he speaks less, but also, the things he says are more essentialized, he does not feel the need to explain himself in many words. Even when they are required because of their situation, he does so in the least possible way. He’s a guy who’s looking for shortcuts and the less he has to say, the better, he thinks we don’t really have to get so much out of his mouth.

Regarding Relu’s physicality, there are some differences in that sense as well – which I assume also relates to his character development and his maturity in terms of the organization, but also of the increasing complexity of his situation.

He is a character that was developed along the way. No matter how funny it sounds to say this, but he is no longer the same man in season I, not just because he went through certain things, but also because of the fact that Şerban Pavlu has also advanced in his relationship with him. In the first season I was very concerned about this physical part, it seemed slightly overhand to me. He is a man who enters rooms a certain way in the, sits on a chair in a certain way and so on. I was aware of these things. And one time, I was laughing with a friend of mine who isn’t in the film industry, who told me that Relu looks like he had spent time in jail. And what do you say to that? You’re not saying he’s short, or tall, or muscular, or weak. Not at all! A guy who did prison time. This is the job of the actor, to work with these sensations.

This is how I imagined him – a guy who says something through his presence, one that is neutral: he does not wear colorful clothes, for example. After all, that’s the nature of his job – he’s a money-maker. It’s not like he goes someplace to fight – on the contrary, his goal is not to fight and to leave with the cash as soon as possible. I solved this part across time, and now I felt the need to worry more about his psychological side. I have never had such a character, maybe only in theater, where sometimes very physical situations appear in your work. Finding a system of movements that is not yours is difficult – it was not about what to do while in character, but rather about what not to do. There are extremely small details at play – at one point, Mirică, was screaming to come and see myself climbing this ladder. “Look the way you’re climbing!” Mind you, it wasn’t like I was crawling up the stairs on all fours. “Come on, what’s this, don’t you see, how’s this climbing?”

What is it like to spend so much time with a character?

It’s weird! It gives you a certain idea, look, if you want me to answer you as a conscientious actor, about how things should happen. At first you spend your time approaching your character, thinking about how it relates to space, how it moves, how it speaks and gestures. And so, in time, you have a certain sense of security that the ample dimension of the project offers to you. Obviously it is harder in other respects and you work more, but from a certain point you start to feel that you are in control of pushing the buttons, and from one point onwards you no longer think about how to push them like you did on day one. You just push them, and then you can think of other things which are more complicated, you no longer get scared of hearing “Camera, action!”

This season you work a lot with Costel Cașcaval, who plays the character of Nicu – and the two of you worked for the first time in Terminus Paradis, 20 years ago. How was it to have worked together again?

Yes, we did! Well, but to me it’s not a very clear reference to that film. Bogdan likes Costel Cașcaval, and this role would not have been interpreted in the same way by any other actor. It’s a role I imagined differently when I was reading the script and I can certainly say that it was a pleasure to see Costel doing something different from what I had imagined. It’s a very cool thing, to feel surprise as an actor. As much as he could, he took the character to a very specific area, which isn’t just a very banal kind of “evil” character. For example, the costume choices of the character seemed exaggerated at first, to me, but suddenly, after he dressed up in those clothes, I said, “Yeah, boy!”. You believed him, you truly believed him. It wasn’t the director and costume designer talking through the character anymore, it was the man himself talking to you. And I thought that was great.

I would like to talk to you a little about Lucian Pintilie – who was discussed quite insufficiently after his death – what was it like working with him? There are many legendary stories about how he was like on set.

It was amazing for me. I knew his legend and loved it – I’m talking about the one that took shape during his lifetime – maybe more than others’. What I had heard about him, the films I have watched – for example, Carnival Scenes, which I had watched five times – are at this formidable intersection between theater, film, and Caragiale, which I know may sound strange. As an acting student, I watched the film with a great pleasure, just as I liked the actors that he worked with in the film and what happened to them. Reconstruction, Carnival Scenes and The Oak were three movies from my top 5. Then came his legend from the theater, which was exactly suited to my taste, to what I imagined – a kind of director-dictator, but a kind of enlightened dictatorship, a permanent source of inspiration, to which you could really connect yourself. And it really was like that in reality – his scholarship, his affinity for literature, the way he wrote. I loved literature and I related a lot to imaginary universes in books, somehow in that I found a sort of a closeness to my own profession, because when you discover a world you also discover the people in it. Literary references were always extremely important for Pintilie.

Terminus Paradis is based on Radu Aldulescu’s Amantul colivaresei/ The Lover of the Funeral Cake Lady.

I wanted to get here. Amantul colivaresei – I loved this novel, I devoured it. Adulescu’s rough style is very in tune with my tastes, I like it a lot. He was born the same day as me, you know. But, above all, it was the vision of Lucian Pintilie, who for me was an idol, and once you touch him, once you become acquainted with him, he is not at all disappointing, on the contrary – he makes you look at him in an even higher regard. I would have liked for him to have continued to work in the theater, too, because his great fame, the place where things actually happened, seems to me to have been there. I deeply regret his disappearance from the theater scene, and then from life itself.

Then there was a kind of sympathy, I have no idea why, that he had for me. I don’t know if he really felt it or was just in my head, but it is true that I was never afraid of him, which many other actors were. Or, I felt like a fish in the water: I was just waiting for him to scream at me, to ironize, minimize me, to make me eat 18 pieces of cake in his infamous takes. It was like going to a massage. I was at the height of my happiness, and the feeling that I had while I was doing my job with Lucian Pintilie was incredible. It could have easily turned into the kind of relationship in which the director tramples over you. He wasn’t an easy-going guy, but it never seemed to me that cruelty was a part of his system. I also heard actors saying that this is not how a director should behave with his cast, while I considered him to be above most other directors.

And this was also seen in the influence he had.

I think he had a major influence on the New Wave. I would have liked to work with him again, it was a great start for me. I was also trying out for Too Late, it was a thing – he said, “Honey, I don’t really need you, but I would like you to be here too.” You know, I was a student, and you felt these things in a special way – the fact that that man wants you to be there. So I went to Petrosani, cause that’s what Lucian Pintilie wanted. I don’t even know if I still show up in the final movie or not – a sequence was cut partially, where I was coming with another miner to arrest Victor Rebengiuc.

There is also that role in The Afternoon of a Torturer, where only your voice is heard.

But that was a serious thing! It was an option on the set, but we rehearsed a lot for that role, and I really love it now. Back then, I didn’t quite understand what we were doing, but I rewatched the film recently and thought, “Damn, you were a such a dumb kid.” I didn’t understand the whole thing, or my function within its economy, it all seemed a bit surreal to me. Now I would wholeheartedly play such a role.

It’s a very powerful role. Which hints at the greater political reality of Romania in the late nineties.

It’s a strong role and I’m afraid I wasn’t not strong enough for that role. As for the political side … I do not know if Pintilie had a Cassandra complex, but there are some premonitions in his films. He was constantly consumed by these things, it was a constant problem for him. A constant concern for politics and for our country’s historical path.

Since we are talking about political cinema, I would like to ask you about your collaboration with Radu Jude. You’re in all his movies, right?

I think so! (laughs) Except for The Tube with a Hat.

What was it like working with him throughout his career, from his debut feature film 11 years ago? Also considering the artistic discourse of Radu Jude and its development, which is going in a completely remarkable direction. How was this whole journey in which you played both main characters and smaller roles?

It was fabulous! For me, he is a permanent connection with the art cinema, and I must admit, he is also a kind of mentor for me in this direction, without him knowing it. I talk to him often about cinema and this is the reality – even though I got to read some things about cinema on my own, there were usually things that he recommended to me. And I’m not even talking about the films that he recommended.

And then, for me, what Radu does and the fact that he has this ability, which is all about style – of having no style, of detaching himself from this idea that you must always be true to yourself. And this thing seems very cool to me, that is true post-post-modernism. And beyond this there is actually a red thread and there is a Radu Jude very loyal to some principles in each of his films, it’s not like they’re done by someone else. That is a fundamental element of this style – no one can see one of his films and automatically say “Ah, this is a Radu Jude, look at how the actors are dressed up, at how the camerawork is.” That’s really cool, I really like it.

To jump from Scarred Hearts to Barbarians, how cool is that! And these increasingly frequent forays of his into documentary film. Plus, his latest film – Tipografic Majuscul – which is in a highly interesting stylistic area again. I can no longer have such an objective relationship because I am a friend of him and I admire him very much! I don’t know why he does this (laughs) thing of calling me up for each film, but as long as he does it, I’m very happy.

He recalls many different eras in his recent films. How does this reflect on you as an actor, who works with the same director, but in narratives placed at different historical times?

I think there is a minimal concentration on historic mimetism but rather it’s mostly about Radu’s perspective, which is very Brechtian. And this belief, that you can’t bring an era back to life – and here we can lay down endless clichées – but, fictional cinema is not an art by which you reconstruct things as they were 100 years ago. Like in Spartacus, where they speak English – this whole thing about the English language in films about antiquity is already my personal pet peeve. I can’t even watch such movies anymore, at least not without this outlook.

I recently rewatched (and unfortunately I don’t see as many movies as I would like) Colonel Redl by Istvan Zsabo, with Klaus Maria Brandauer. If you do this exercise now, you will also notice the differences between how historical films were made back in the day and how they are made now, and based on these differences you realize things – and I am not referring here to stylistic decisions, but to the technical support of the films itself, you can observe the technological advancements. And this is the best example that you can have as a spectator in order to realize that, in fact, no one is reconstructing any historical period, it is just a representation, a convention in which we present some facts that we judge with our contemporary mindset. Because our moral filter is constantly changing. But people really buy into the reconstruction of things.

Watching Colonel Redl, which is about the Austro-Hungarian empire, I was already aware that the images are being shot in a certain way, that the actors have specific haircuts, the camera was specific, the colors, the film stock they used … if it had been made in the 2000s, it would have been completely different, although the subject would have been the same. Or Kubrick’s Barry Lindon! (laughs) I mean, the acting has something in it that is very seventies! Well, Radu has this particular vision of how you adapt history and now I see things like that too – sure, Aferim! is still very close to that model, but the sensation of immersion is constantly broken. And you can’t even do method acting as an actor in such a movie. Plus, Radu’s style of directing is very upfront with the actors, he doesn’t ask you to dive into the character, but he tells you “Look, here you’re doing something laughable”, or “Here you are pathetic”, “Here you talk a bit louder”, so you don’t discuss any principles – and I love that.

Last question. What projects are you working on right now?

Now I’m doing some castings. So, just castings. I have a little bit left till I turn 45 – and I have a career, as some say. In the meantime, I can be found at the Bulandra Theater, where I play at the very limits of my physical endurance in Coriolanus and Love’s Labour’s Lost, both by William Shakespeare. And in cinema, the Tipografic Majuscul will be shortly released, wherein, if you drop your handkerchief you lost me, but (laughs) …

Flavia Dima

Film critic & journalist. Collaborates with local and international outlets, programs a short film festival - BIEFF, does occasional moderating gigs and is working on a PhD thesis about home movies. At Films in Frame, she writes the monthly editorial - The State of Cinema and is the magazine's main festival reporter.