In America, she is considered a French actress of Ukrainian origin. In France – Russian with Ukrainian roots. She is our American. She lives between languages, between countries and continents, between professions, between film genres and trends. But “between” in her case does not mean that she does not belong to either camp. Meeting with Olga Kurylenko, for whom “between” is a synonym for freedom.
She speaks fluent French and English, tirelessly improving Spanish, but her native language is Russian, although she has known Ukrainian since childhood. And recently, for a role in Russell Crowe’s The Water Finder, she had to learn Turkish …
She works all over the world, equally coping with roles in problematic auteur films and blockbusters, and sincerely wonders why most interviewers are always interested in her “beauty secrets”, how she looks after her inimitable appearance, which designer she prefers and what type of man she is. “The opinion that I have about a person when I read an interview like this can be completely wrong. This means that the one who reads my interview may also have the wrong opinion. In any case, when I read my interview, I know that I am completely different, ”Olga admits. She wonders why we are so interested in the superficial, entertaining. And there is no arrogance in this. In fact, she hardly thinks what impression she makes. It’s just that she is against false ideas, she does not want to consist of appearance, model parameters and trademarks. No, she is an actress and ready to entertain us, but she herself is not entertainment or a book of recommendations on image and lifestyle. She’s too direct for that, too realistic. And too rebellious, judging by what she says about her new role.
Read more:
- “The Water Finder” by Russell Crowe
Psychologies: I keep thinking about your Aisha from The Water Seeker. A woman who, a hundred years ago in traditionalist Turkey, refused to follow tradition and become a widow to marry her husband’s brother. She was left alone with the children, without a livelihood. She can also be called an early feminist.
Olga Kurilenko: And I admire women who stand up for their faith, their principles. Some perceive the very word “feminism” negatively. For me, this is absolutely not the case. This is a great thing. Everyone should have the right to stand up for what they believe in, the right to their lives. You know, it’s interesting… When I was preparing for the role, I learned so much about Turkey from the times of the Ottoman Empire from the Internet, from books! But nothing about the women of the Ottoman Empire. So before filming, already in Turkey, I talked a lot with Turkish women, I needed to find out about their relationship with traditions, with the expectations of society. And I was helped a lot by one woman who experienced about the same situation as Ayse, already in our time. She refused to marry the brother of her deceased husband, although tradition insists that it is impossible to refuse. Relatives turned away from her, she was left alone with two children, without support … She worked as a cleaner. And her choice was dictated by what is best for children. She wanted her children to have a voice in this situation. Yes, everyone has the right to defend themselves.
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- Strong women, strong men
View from the top
Olga Kurylenko is close to the highest point of her career. She has a truly stellar role in Stephen Campanelli’s action-packed Fast-Track: an irresistible thief who comes into conflict with a crime syndicate. And her partners are Morgan Freeman and James Purefoy. From a height of 35 years, it is not bad to survey the past and the future. But for a Hollywood actress, this is the age of choice. Where will she take her next step?
Have you ever had to defend yourself?
OK.: Naturally. Everything I have done in my life is a way to stand up for myself. And I did everything alone, myself, alone, as you can see. I wasn’t looking for a rich husband. I left my homeland and moved to another country as a teenager. I became what I became, and never used the help of men.
And it’s even funny: the most, perhaps, the main help, help at the start, which 13-year-old Olga received, and that came from a woman. Natalya Kremenskaya, director of the Academy of Stars modeling agency, saw Olya with her mother in the Moscow metro. Olya’s mother is an artist, then she worked as a drawing teacher. And in 1992, which was dramatic for the USSR and its inhabitants, she nevertheless considered it her duty to take her daughter to the capital on vacation. So that she would look at the Kremlin with her own eyes, at the wonders of architecture. To see the Ryabushinsky mansion, built by the architect Shekhtel on Nikitskaya. To share my mother’s enthusiasm for some of the paintings in the Tretyakov Gallery and find there those that she herself will love … This trip to Moscow changed Olga forever. And, as it turned out later, her life. Olga will now be confused by the questions of foreign journalists: how did you live in your native Berdyansk? What clubs did you go to, what films did you watch? What clubs? Which films? Berdyansk is a small resort town in Ukraine, there were no clubs, and neither American nor European films were shown in cinemas. Olya’s family – mother, grandmother, grandfather (parents divorced when Olya was 3 years old) – lived in a modest apartment, on modest salaries: her mother taught at school, grandmother Raya was a doctor in a sanatorium. Olya’s teenage years were due to a change in the social order in the country: she remembers well the total deficit, queues and sugar coupons. It was then that a woman approached Olya and her mother in the Moscow metro and invited her to audition. Olya was selected, she studied at the Academy of Stars, and began acting for Russian glossy magazines that had barely emerged. And for the first big fee of $ 100, I bought a VCR. Olga drove him from Moscow to Berdyansk, incredibly proud of herself – this was her contribution to family life! Then she did not guess that this thing was even more fateful. It was on this VCR that Olga saw “Paris, Texas” by Wenders and “The Tin Drum” by Schlöndorff. She discovered great cinema. The perspective is set.
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- “Women who have everything and want nothing”
And at the age of 16, Kurylenko received an invitation to work in Paris from the famous Madison Models Agency in fashion circles. Olga believes that if it were not for Moscow and Paris, if she had stayed in Berdyansk, she would certainly have become a doctor: her grandmother’s medical literature and reference books, with their excellent anatomical illustrations and intelligibility, were her childhood reading. That is, she wanted to become an actress, she played in the school theater, but … Berdyansk, the turning point of eras … Acting could not become her life, the life of a girl from a town in the province, the daughter of a teacher. She had already been of sound mind since she was a teenager. Olga says that it is her family, direct and honest people, and life in the USSR, a country of utopias, made her a realist. And now, when asked about her fears, she answers in such a way that the answer can be interpreted metaphorically: “I’m afraid of heights. So I try to stay close to the ground.”
“Believe in yourself and don’t count on much,” was her motto in life. With such baggage, Olga arrived in Paris. And, as she now says, she immediately found herself alone with the whole world. It was an amazing feeling: all borders are open. Perhaps she still holds the same position – alone with the world, without assistants, intermediaries and rose-colored glasses. She categorically does not believe in a happy accident and claims: “Luck does not exist. There is only hard work.” And then, being a model in Paris, she did not go to parties and did not look for influential patrons. All her free time she read and studied French. And I went to the cinema. She saw “Breaking the Waves” by Lars von Trier and thought: if acting is what can help you play the role that Emily Watson played – and how she played! – which is exactly what you should be doing.
Read more:
- Michael Fassbender: “I owe a lot to my naivete”
Bond and her other men
Olga Kurylenko, who gained fame as a Bond girl, in real life met with men who keep secrets no worse than agent 007. It seems that Olga made a pact of modesty with her ex-husbands: she is silent about them, they avoid publicity. Keeping the pact is relatively easy for an American mobile accessories entrepreneur. Damien Gabrielli, whom Olga was married for a year and a half; their marriage ended in 2007. And here is the French Cedric van Mol, who was her first husband from 2000 to 2005, is a well-known photo artist. The Web is full of his work, but to find a photo of himself, you need a team of hackers.
However, now Olga herself is a lot and willingly removed with an actor. Danny Huston. Two seasons of City of Dreams made them a couple, although Houston is 17 years older. His track record today includes 50 roles, including in the blockbusters Wrath of the Titans and X-Men. And besides, he comes from the glorious Houston film dynasty: Anjelica Huston is his sister.
Was it difficult to explain to your family that you are leaving, most likely forever, to become a model?
OK.: I didn’t need to explain anything. Mom knew where I was going and why. Yes, she was afraid for me – I’m her only child and girl … But, you see, my mother always talked to me. Seriously, equals. I am sure that this is the only true way of education – real contact. I’ve been reading all these arguments about children who run away from home. I think there is only one explanation – the lack of communication in the family. People simply do not know what is happening with their children, what they feel, what they dream about. My mom always knew.
But usually mothers are afraid to let their daughters go…
OK.: To be afraid and therefore not to do is one thing. Being afraid and yet letting go is another thing. She is very brave, my mother. She overcame her fears for me. She did not give free rein to parental egoism.
Read more:
- Sharon Stone: “My basic instinct is work”
Olga is ready to talk about her mother, it seems, endlessly. That my mother is a real artist and, by and large, she doesn’t care where she lives – she could move to London (Olga settled there after 13 years of living in Paris). After all, her talent is in extraordinary hands and imagination – she sprinkles incredible art ideas. That from every foreign trip my mother travels with overweight baggage – she carries materials for work, art raw materials. That in fact, my mother would never move to her in London – she is too independent a person, she has her own house and her own life, she has been happily married for 20 years. And there, in Berdyansk, her cousins, cousins, and the whole family, and friends … That her mother always had an absolute priority, that’s why her mother did not get married while Olya lived at home. That her mother gave her so much love and care that Olga has not used up this reserve until now. And this in many ways created her success – faith in herself from here too. And she firmly believes that believing in yourself is the key to success. Not patrons and agents, but faith in oneself at the heart of Kurylenko’s enchanting, without exaggeration, career.
“Everyone should have the right to stand up for what they believe. what I did in life was my way of standing up for myself.”
Do you help your family?
OK.: Certainly. Why not? All my relatives live well, partly thanks to me. It’s nice. How to feel like a mom. I have no children, but now, thank God, there is such an experience – my boyfriend has a little daughter. And I finally learned what it means to be a mother. I really, really liked it.
Would you like another new experience? Become a director like Russell Crowe, for example?
OK.: Absolutely not. I won’t do what I know I can’t do.
A harsh answer, I think. Inflexible. But, on the other hand, expected. It looks so much like Olga. She once said that she was a man of discipline. That he hates wasting time and being late. That it is as if a second person is sitting in her, her “internal commander”, who invariably puts her in her place. For the same reason – her organization and sanity – she does not like to make plans. Doesn’t make rigid schedules and… always leaves room for surprise. Life is full of surprises, it’s true. This is true sanity. I thought. Olga continues…
OK.: But what I really love is writing. I have always written. And recently there was a break in work for two months, and I pulled up my Spanish, signed up for a course in philosophy and a course in screenwriting. I write all the time – a diary, stories. Lots of stories, really. Do not ask, I do not publish and do not intend to.
And it seems to me, in vain. I would love to read the writer Kurylenko. Although she herself does not seem to see herself as a writer in the future. And who does he see? You will not believe. A decrepit old woman in the south of France. “This is a very good place…to die. I have already chosen.” And then I understand why Olga Kurylenko treats interviewers with some prejudice. After all, any journalist, having heard this, immediately tries to switch to … the secrets of her beauty.