Javier Gutiérrez: "In his day I would have liked to be a chef"

Juan Naharro Giménez (Getty Images for Disney)

His most recent incarnation is called Pino, a prisoner in La Modelo prison in Barcelona who finds himself involved in an episode with a high level of violence and politics during the Transition.

That role in

, by Alberto Rodríguez, is the last of the many lives of actor Javier Gutiérrez (Luanco, Asturias, 1971).

Define

It is a story of poetic justice and solidarity.

It is a cinema of risk and necessary commitment.

What have you learned from the history of Spain when shooting

Not only me, I think that the viewers who see it will also understand a chapter or a part of that story called by many as idyllic that the Transition was, but that for me has more grays than whites.

If that time was gray, what color is the current one?

I am not very optimistic, especially after these two years of pandemic.

We have hardly learned anything, we are a more selfish and anesthetized society.

He has played a policeman and a prisoner, an executive and a circumstantial coach of a basketball team.

How do all these extremes coexist in your head?

The actor's job is to try to understand the character and make it not only believable, but also show different points of view.

Whatever the character, I try to find a point of light, a crack for people to empathize with.

What role is left for him to play?

I would like to return to Shakespeare, whenever I have done it in theater it has left a bitter aftertaste.

Shakespeare still all the personalities of the great characters of the theater.

I've always been left with a thorn in my side, so I hope I meet the bard again.

Is there a classic (movie, book) that you have recently discovered?

I have been doing the theatrical version of

a work that is the history of our cinema and of our past.

I have also recently revisited Fernando Fernán Gómez: his films like

are still quite unknown and are worth seeing.

The last series you have seen in one go?

I don't have time, reconciling family life with my job is very difficult.

I envy friends who talk to me about series and consume them almost compulsively.

But I would stick with a classic: there is no better series than

What book is open on the nightstand?

, by Santiago Lorenzo, a necessary author in our time.

I am enjoying it very much, it has a very black humor.

What is the movie you have seen the most times?

There are two:

and

, by Vittorio de Sica.

I am a great lover of Italian neorealism.

What movie or play would you live in?

I think in a musical.

It would be nice

Being from the north, I am used to bad weather.

If you had to use a song or piece of music as a self-portrait, what would it be?

I was recently watching Fernando León's documentary about Sabina.

Songs like

remind me of the young man I was.

What is socially overrated?

The posture, the social networks.

I claim to enjoy a conversation, at a table, without a phone, so as not to be tempted to take selfies.

What is the historical event you most admire?

The fall of the Berlin wall.

When did you know you would be an actor?

He knew it before arriving in Madrid, when he was 15 or 16 years old.

It was a bit of running away from myself, I was a very shy boy and I felt better in other outfits.

As a teenager I had that drive.

If I hadn't been an actor, I would have been...

In his day I would have liked to be a cook, because of not going through hardship, or a criminologist, I guess because of that thing that we actors have to investigate the characters.

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