After turning 80, Susana Alexander (Mexico City, 1943) has announced that she is retiring from the theater.
“But how?” Many of her followers, journalists and artists said in unison.
“As you hear it,” she replies.
“I'm tired,” she says, as if she had a well-thought-out response.
The first actress and reference of Mexican theater has spent more years of her life on stage than on stage.
She started at seven thanks to her mother, Brigitte Alexander, the first producer on public television in Mexico and says that the time has come to say goodbye to big productions.
Faced with the cries of many of her, Susana Alexander opens her big blue eyes and smiles: “I don't have time left.
As León Felipe said:
I'm going to die and I'm in a hurry
."
Known for her performance in countless soap operas and theatrical comedies, she has never been a typical actress.
Many of her know her from the play
How to Be a Good Jewish Mother
, released in 1979 and which has been running for so many years that the Jewish mother ended up becoming a Jewish grandmother.
Daughter of an exiled family of German Jews in the 1940s, Alexander says that the key to humor is to start by “laughing at yourself.”
When she turned 72, she made the leap to cinema for the first time with the film
Grandma's Birthday
, by director Javier Colinas, and now she is about to release the series
Mama Cake
, on Star+, about a woman who sells marijuana cakes to complete her income. pension.
Alexander on the stage of the Rafael Solana theater, after the rehearsals of 'The speed of autumn'. Aggi Garduño
The actress is proud to tell how she has always used the money she earned in the most commercial projects to do whatever she wanted in the theater.
As an actress, producer, director or all three at the same time.
“I have always said that television was my husband and the theater was my lover,” she says, amused.
She has a strong character, acid humor and an infectious laugh that reaches every corner of the stage;
But above all, she says she has the satisfaction of having lived life fully, in bites, without having missed anything.
The interview occurs after the rehearsal of his next play:
The Speed of Autumn
, which will premiere at the Rafael Solana Theater in Mexico City on February 17 and where he shares the spotlight with Alejandro Canek.
As has become her personal trademark, Alexander produces, directs and interprets the story of an octogenarian who wants to die in her house and refuses to end her days in an asylum, just as her son wants.
The play, full of difficult truths, becomes a song about life with overtones of comedy that forces parents and children to have a deep conversation when the curtain falls.
Ask.
What do you feel every time you go on stage?
Answer.
It's time to rise to success.
we do not know how to do otherwise.
That's what I always say.
Q.
And do you have any ritual before going on stage?
A.
No. We drink coffee, we talk... What I don't like is being interviewed when I go to work.
They take me out of my world.
Q.
So today we have broken your routine a little...
A.
No, not at all.
That's why we finished the rehearsal early so you can be at your interview.
Q.
Why are you leaving, Susana?
A.
I don't want to do theater anymore.
I'm tired.
Suddenly I turned 80 and I said, what an outrage.
Since I was so busy looking for works, soap operas... the years flew by and I felt good.
Until suddenly my older brother died at 73, my twin died at 78... and I lost several twenties.
I realized that I have very little time left.
Q.
Tell me about
The Speed of Autumn
.
I understand that it is his last work...
A.
This is my last work and it is a very significant work.
Everything he says is fantastic.
Q.
The work precisely talks about a woman who is saying goodbye to her family and who wants to live what is left of her life at home.
Does something similar happen to you?
A.
Yes, I'm also saying goodbye to everything.
For example, I no longer keep books.
Now I give them away.
The books in the bookshelves are no longer useful.
Actually I would like to get rid of everything.
And you know what?
The character in this work is very similar to me.
I live alone.
Well, I live with Lola, my dog...
The actress Susana Alexander during the rehearsal of the play 'The speed of autumn'. Aggi Garduño
Q.
I had read that you had 14 dogs...
A.
In Mexico, just one, and I have the others in my house in Oaxtepec (Morelos).
There are only 14 now, but I have reached 40. All of them picked up from the street, I remember them all and I carry them all in my heart.
Q.
That tells me that you have a good heart. Do you consider yourself a good person?
A.
Yes, I am a good person.
And you know what?
I'm terrified of people who are complicated, haha.
As my son says: “Oh, mommy, you're so predictable…” Because it's very clear what I like and what I don't like.
Q.
Do you want to say goodbye to the public?
A.
Not from them because I want to continue doing my seven one-man works.
I really like to do those.
I have for Mother's Day, I have for Grandparents' Day, I have for the blessed menopause, for Women's Day... So, I want them to continue hiring me to do my sole proprietorships, but I don't want to do any more great works.
Q.
Do you think that talking about some topics is still taboo in culture, television, cinema... now that you mention menopause?
A.
Yes, but I talk about it like that, so light, so beautiful, that they laugh a lot.
Although, well, I don't treat gentlemen very well.
Poor things, they are clumsy, but, as I always say, you have to love them, you have to love them.
Q.
Would you say that with the spoon of comedy everything goes better?
A.
Much better, yes.
The first time I read
The Speed of Autumn
I thought, what
a drama!
But then I found out how to make it lighter, although what she says is very important.
The topic of death must be touched upon, but always gently.
Susana Alexander at 13 years old, in the program 'Theater Mondays with Antonio Passi'.
Personal file
Q.
You have been an actress since you were very little, what do these almost 80 years of experience look like?
R.
They look like they are nobody...
Q.
But you are someone.
She is an important actress in this country...
A.
Hahaha.
Look, if I were anyone I wouldn't have to be fucking around after 80 years, right?
Just for me to say, I'm going to retire, would have to be enough for people to say, let's go see it and it's not going to be like that.
I'm going to have to go
one after another
so that people know that I'm leaving, that they won't see me anymore.
Point and it's over.
As I always tell people who come to the theater: thank you for the miracle of your presence, because it is a miracle.
Q.
Why?
A.
Because people don't go to the theater in Mexico, they are not educated to do so.
They don't go to the dance either, my daughter Tatiana, who is an extraordinary dancer, tells me: today we were full and they only had 40 people.
Q.
And what can be done to bring people to the theaters?
A.
It's education, mommy.
I worked for 40 years with the Ministry of Education making representations.
There, wherever you arrive, the most annoying town, that's where I passed.
Before I was very idealistic and I thought that with these works we were going to change people's lives.
Now, if it reaches just one of those people, I'm satisfied.
People don't want to pay 700 pesos to come see us, but you pass by the restaurants at 12 at night and they are all jammed.
The only thing you're going to do after that is digest and fuck up.
On the other hand, maybe a play changes your life.
Q.
Do you think culture is useful for something?
A.
Yes I believe so.
Completely.
When you read, you transform.
When she listens to Mozart, when she goes to see a play... I remember a lady who went to see a monologue called
Shirley Valentine
, which in Spanish I translated as
Pepe and Valentina
.
The story tells the life of an older woman whom her husband despises and she identified with.
One day she sent me a card and she told me that she had left her husband and that she had gone to work.
In the end she signed,
The brave Valentina
.
She made me very excited to read that card.
Q.
I don't know if with so many years of career you have come across that ignorance and that machismo...
A.
There is never a lack of someone who wants to be smarter than you.
So, well, you give them the plane and then you do what you want.
Q.
And what do you prefer to direct or act?
A.
Both things.
I can't choose one.
I like everything.
But, above all, I like to have the upper hand.
That's why I also produce.
Q.
What is Susana Alexander going to do after she leaves the stage?
A.
I am going to continue working because I have to support my 14 dogs.
You have to give them their vaccines, their tick and flea supplies, and buy their kibble.
But, above all, I want to read.
Besides being with my dogs, what I like most is reading while lying in my bed.
Q.
What is the last book you read?
A.
I just read one called
Tasmania
, by Paolo Giordano and I am now reading one of Irene Vallejo's stories.
When I stay awake, I read the wonderful things she writes about the Greeks, the Romans... wonderful.
Q.
What are your dogs to you?
A.
They are my companions.
It's the only thing that worries me if I die.
Who am I going to leave my dogs with?
Alexander during the interview with EL PAÍS. Aggi Garduño
Q.
What do you want audiences to take away after seeing
The Speed of Autumn
?
A.
I want our children to respect people my age and understand that we can live alone.
If you saw how happy I live alone.
There will be a time, perhaps, when I will need care, but until that comes, I can do everything alone.
Because I have two children outside who are bothering and bothering that they want to take me to a nursing home.
Q.
And what do you tell them?
A.
No.
That I want to die here, in my apartment.
Q.
How do you face death, Susana, does it scare you?
A.
Not afraid.
I know what's going to happen.
I hope one day I fall asleep or, if not, I may have a heart attack.
Dying is a change of stage, a change of level.
Nothing else.
Furthermore, I have lived very fully.
I have eaten very well, I have had lovers, I have had two children and four extraordinary grandchildren.
So, life, you owe me nothing;
life, we are at peace.
What I do hope is to never lose my sense of dignity, sense of humor and sexual desire.
Well, although my sexual desire has already passed, hahaha.
Q.
At 80 years old, does one no longer have sexual desire?
A.
Nothing, nothing.
Remember that hormones run out.
I had a very nice body, but now, when I see myself in the mirror, I wouldn't dare to get naked in front of a man, because for the rest of my life I would be impotent after seeing this shit.
P.
It will be for less...
A.
Believe it, believe it.
Although it is also interesting to say: this is my new body.
This is the new me.
And it is important to accept it.
Q.
Are you going to miss the stage?
A.
No.
Q.
Are you sure?
A.
Yes, but no.
I'm tired.
That's why I just want to do nothing more than my works, which I love.
Those texts that I handle give me life, they are like my lifeblood.
They make me feel alive.
The best payment an actor or actress can receive is for the public to come back again.
May they come see you and be with you.
The Speed of Autumn
will be on display until April 27 at the Rafael Solana Theater in Mexico City.
The actress poses behind the scenes of the Rafael Solana theater. Aggi Garduño
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