Angelina Jolie’s interviews are still coming out because she spent the better part of four months hustling for Pablo Larrain’s Maria. I used to dream of days like this, with Angelina doing these huge promotional tours. The only bad part about it is that Jolie is very repetitive, and people keep asking her about the same thing, how she thinks learning how to sing opera is therapeutic. In this recently published Dazed Digital interview, she talks about that and she brings up something new: how Pablo Larrain was operating the camera as they shot Maria. That explains the intimacy they have with each other, and how much Angelina seems to trust him.

Opera singing as therapy: “I’m telling you, I’m going to start therapy sessions for people….It’s the best. It’s beyond that primal scream because it’s all sounds, but it’s a depth that very few people have ever been asked to express. It’s everything you have, whatever it is that you’re feeling. It’s to open up, and know yourself. It’s not just this uncontrolled, unhinged sound. It’s trying to really connect with your own voice, your own breath, your own body, and to express something. In an opera, it comes with a lot of really heavy emotion. In normal acting, you’re expressing yearning. You want something. In opera, it is huge. It’s huge.

Whether opera training is similar to physical training for an action film: “I think anything where you’re pushing your body to an extreme, to test yourself against the world, to see what you can do, to see what you have in you – it’s aways a really important thing for people to do. I don’t think we do it enough today. There’s so much focus on people being comfortable today. Something making something easier for somebody. Somebody finding a way to do it the shortest way.

How Pablo Larrain operated the camera in ‘Maria’: “We were dancing. Also – we’ve never talked about this – it really helps when your director is behind the camera. It draws something out of you that you want to communicate. [Turns to Larraín] I wanted to communicate something to you. I knew you were there to catch it. But I was also speaking to you through this….We’re onstage together in the opera. We’re in the dressing room. I’m crying and weeping, and he’s sitting next to me. It’s probably why he draws so much intimacy out of his characters and actors. When you see his films and really feel something with the performances, it’s because he’s so connected to them.

Maria Callas is so strong and vulnerable: “I think that’s true, though. The strongest people in the world are the ones who are able to be honest and open with their emotional life.

Younger people should listen to opera: “Yes, and to not see it as something that doesn’t belong to them. I felt that growing up as an American and somebody of a different generation. I thought: this isn’t really for me. I was completely wrong. Everybody should sit in the dark, put it on, and let it have its effect. I think they’ll fall in love with it.

[From Daze Digital]

My question: is it crazy for me to want Angelina and Pablo to date or something more? I guess I’m doing a vibe check – they obviously became quite close through this process, but is there the potential for something romantic or sexual? Hm. As for Angelina’s comments about young people, I agree. The film could conceivably convince Gen Z to go to the opera or listen to opera. You never know.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.