Q: What drew you to the part of Selima?
Y: Everything. Everything. She is written in such a charming
way. I like everything about her. First that she belongs to the seventeenth
century. It’s fascinating for me to go back in history. I love history,
especially at that time. I did some research to try to understand how an Arab
Princess end up on an island at that time. So I discovered that she would have
come from Al-Andalus, Arabs in Spain, and it was just fascinating all the
things that I started to read about and connecting this to pirates and how she
met Blackbeard and how she ended up running away with him to Santa Campana.
From the first lines it was just a fairy tale, you know?
And everything else, when I started discovering her
personality, I discovered a very modern way of writing that also made Neil stand
out as a really great writer. He writes in a very modern way. There are no bad
and good people in the show, and what I think for Selima, I think applies to
the rest of the characters. There are no good or bad; there are human beings.
They are deceiving, they are unpredictable, they are vulnerable at the same
time. And sometimes they will surprise you, and they will be like your hero.
It is human nature, and this is what I like. It is written
in a very modern way, and this is what I like. She’s strong, serious, educated,
not intimidated by men. She’s connected to her sensuality, but this is not
everything about her. She has the dream. I really like her. There are many
differences between me and her – I’m not her. I am not Selima, but Selima is
definitely a woman that is fascinating. She’s a fascinating character to play.
Q: What was the audition process like? I read that you sent
in an audition tape – how did that work?
Y: The story is very long. We were in Jordan because we’d
just had a baby, and I really needed help, so we moved to be with my husband’s
mother. And I was just, really, changing diapers and feeding, that was my life.
And my manager sent me Selima at two in the morning because of the time
difference between the US and the Arab world. And I said, I am doing this! This
is mine! I’m Selima! And I woke up the next day and I put on a dress,
literally, and a crown, and I put on makeup, and I sat in my bed, and I finished
reading the first episode, the Pilot, and my manager wanted me to put myself on
tape, so I asked some friends to come over and put me on tape. And I made a
mini-movie of my own vision of who Selima is and the story. And I sent it to my
manager, and actually, the first answer was negative. I didn’t get it. And I
was so sad. I was very, very sad.
And a week later my manager called, and she said send me
your audition again! And I thought Wow! Maybe the sky heard me? Praying and
saying it was unfair for me not to get it, so I sent the tape again, and it was
Avy Kaufman who was auditioning, who is a great casting director, and she says
I love her, she’s Selima. And I had to pitch her from the road. I had to put
myself on tape twice more after that one tape. I made three tapes in total, and
I kept taking notes from the Network, from Avy, from my managers. And the
hardest thing to put on tape for Selima, was to really get out of my shell, you
know, as a mother, and show the sexual, sensual fearless side of her. I had to
wake up, shake myself, and put all these things on tape and really cross fingers
every night for one month. It took one month until Margaret called and told me
we’d got it. And in one week, I shipped my whole life, my baby and my husband,
to Puerto Rico, and it was really a dream coming true.
Q: What was it like working in Puerto Rico?
Y: I was working in Puerto Rico on an NBC show. It was more
challenging to be on the set of such a big project. It was very intimidating.
Puerto Rico itself is a very beautiful country. People are very kind, very
cool. They’re not complicated. They’re not stressed. The weather is great. You
know, it’s an island, and they’re really very hard workers. Most of the people
on set, on the production team, were from Puerto Rico, and they work very, very
hard. But the challenging thing was to be on a big set like Crossbones. It’s
huge, and I had never been on such a set. It’s beautiful, just to be on set
every day. It took me some time to get used to it, but it’s definitely
overwhelming. Really impressive.
Q: The sets are gorgeous. That must help get you in that space.
Y: Yes.
Q: I know that you are from Lebanon and you went to school
in Paris and you are a dancer and an artist. How do you balance all of those
artistic outlets? Are you able to continue with dancing and your other artistic
passions too?
Y: It’s very hard. Because becoming a mother was one of the
things that really took me away from what I used to do. When I lived in Paris,
my whole life was about my discipline. Dancing, making my own small, experimental
videos, meeting with artists all the time because Paris is like a hub. Everyone
is trying to live there and create. When you get married, you have to share
yourself with someone else, so I already had less time for my needs for me, and
with my baby it became less and less time, and Crossbones was really my first
project, my first job since I became a mother. I don’t know really. I’m
figuring things out day by day, but dancing is definitely my passion. It will
always be, and I’m trying to figure out. I think it will come back in a way. It
will come back, but I don’t know how or when. I’m still figuring it out.
Q: I was hoping we might get to see Selima doing some
dancing within the show.
Y: There is a very short moment – I don’t want to give you
any spoilers! – where she is doing something... physical!
Q: How would you compare working on a tv series, though
Crossbones isn’t a traditional tv series, with the movies, like Caramel and
Pomegranates and Myrrh that you have done?
Y: Well, these movies are very small. They are shot with
very small budgets, and the drive behind making these movies is believing that
you are being ambassadors for a very noble human cause. Believing in this makes
you go through all the challenges, working for hours, not sleeping, not having
any comfortable place. If you came to these sets, you would be shocked. Most of
them are not really sets. You shoot with what is available around you, and
you’re just trying to get out a story that urgently needs to be told to the
world. It’s more about the people who believe in these stories, and the Arab
world now is socially going through a lot of changes, but the new generation
really believes in art and cinema because it allows us to have a place where we
can express ourselves with no censorship. Most of the young people now are
fascinated with writing their own scripts and making movies about the Arab
world. You will see a lot of movies coming out of the region now like Caramel,
like Pomegranates and Myrrh, that are shot with really nothing in terms of
budget and have a few technicians who come from Europe because Europe does
co-produce a lot of international world cinema. So you have a sound engineer or
a camera guy coming from there, but the rest of the people are really young
students or passionate people who are there because they want to make movies,
they want to create cinema. But we’re not there yet. It will take us some time
before we can call it real cinema, but it’s definitely an exciting time for the
Arab world in terms of creativity now.
Q: Are you able to have any input into Selima, or are you
asked to stick strictly to the script?
Y: You are asked to stick to what is written and what gets
to be written in the last moment. And I think all actors do that. There are
things that they decide for you, and one day you are pregnant and one day you
are not pregnant, and one day you have sex with this character and another day
you are not. There are things that you have to take in, in a very ... you have
to have a very tolerant, flexible muscle, acting muscle, you have to be able to
learn lines the day before the shoot and adapt to changes in scenes, and this
does not exist in cinema. That was maybe one of the biggest challenges for me
doing tv. I’m not used to that, and I’m not used to not knowing everything
about my character in advance, and in tv, they don’t tell you what’s going to
happen to you. There are many things that the actors do not own or decide. But
I definitely give my soul to my character, to Selima. They really empowered the
actors – Ciaran Donnelly was the producer on set, and he really met with every
actor, and he was great. I think he told every one of us these lines. He told
us you own your character, you protect your character.
Q: John Malkovich (Blackbeard) is in the same position
because this would have been his first television role as well.
Y: Yes. John was in the same position. And John and Richard (Coyle
– Tom Lowe) had very big responsibilities on the show. They really carry the
show, and they had a lot of lines to learn. And they had to adapt with a lot of
changes. They were really great, and they were great partners to work with and
to learn from. It was a great, great honor to work with them and be a part of
this experience.
Q: You have great chemistry with both of them. What was it
like working with them?
Y: Yes. We really had great energy. They are all great
people. David (Hoflin – Charlie), his wife Natalie (Hoflin – Rose), my husband
and baby were with me, and my husband got to do a small role as a guest on the
show. It was like a family show! Everybody had their wife or husband or kids working,
and we would meet outside the set because it was a very small compound where we
lived in Puerto Rico. We would all meet in the supermarket or the restaurant at
night and it was really a very beautiful community to belong to for six months.
It was really beautiful. I miss that – it’s one of the things I miss after we
were done shooting the season.
Q: Well, hopefully, you’ll be back there soon shooting
season two! Can you tease anything that might be coming up in the near future
this season?
Y: Selima will keep going after Lowe and she will do
everything to show Blackbeard that he is not to be trusted. Selima is really
unpredictable. In each episode, she has a surprise for you. And this is one of
the amazing things about her. She is really fun, and in each episode there is
something that is being revealed about her personality.
Q: I love how smart she is and how well she holds her own
with the men.
Y: Instinctive. She has instincts, and it’s really nice to
promote that about women. Women have instincts about things, and I think it’s a
very important thing to describe women and how they listen to their emotions
and they can be a mess sometimes, but she can also be a sorcerer when she
listens and observes the world around her. So Selima is a leading woman.
Q: All three of all the lead women, Rose and Kate (Claire
Foy) and Selima, are all strong women.
Y: Yes. Natalie and Claire are great actresses, and great
women also.
Q: Are we going to see more interaction between the women?
Y: Yes. But I think you will always be hungry for more with
this show. One season is really like an appetizer. Crossbones is a really
juicy, exciting story. There are thousands of things that can be expected in
this show, and there is action between all of the characters. There are a lot
of characters in the show. You’re really going to enjoy this Friday!
It is also respectful. What I like about Crossbones, is the
fact that it respects smart viewers. I believe that people are naturally
intelligent, and if we respect this intelligence, they will understand what we
give them and I appreciate this. And make them not only feel like not cheat
their emotions but make them think and feel better after watching something. I
believe in smart tv and Crossbones is smart tv.
Q: You said you really enjoyed that it was a period piece.
Did you find there were specific challenges to doing a period piece?
Y: I think the challenges are on the director, the art
department people who make decisions. Actors really enjoy the fittings and my
character does not have to go through a lot of changes. I think it’s
challenging for people, for actors who have to change skin or have extra hair.
When preparation time is long in order to get into the character, this is when
period is challenging. But for me, it was absolutely delightful. I’m looking
forward to trying the new dresses every time and picking accessories. It wasn’t
a challenge at all, it was a pleasure!
Don’t forget to tune in to Crossbones, Friday nights on NBC
at 10pm ET!
