He is in two series, one on Star+ and the other on Amazon Prime Video, and he plays completely different characters: in Limbo gets into the skin of a hard of hearing (for which he had to learn sign language) and in the end of love He is the boyfriend of the protagonist, Lali Espósito. in dialogue with THE NATION, Andres Gil talks about his busy present, his beginnings in Ugly Duckling and from her experience working and living in Italy for five years, from where she returned for love.
How did you work on the character? Limbo?
-I had to learn sign language with Kari Hernández, who was my coach, and she helped me a lot in every way because one thinks that it is only learning signs, but there is a lot to take into account. All the senses are at stake, the way of moving, the intention of each phrase in the hands. I internalized little by little and we were able to work on it well. It was an eye-opening and transformative experience as an actor. I am very grateful to have lived it. It is a co-production with Spain that we shot in Buenos Aires for the most part and a week in Madrid, Spain. It was spectacular. The second season is already recorded, but I don’t know when they put it on the air. It is about Sofía (Clara Lago), a young millionaire who, after the death of her father, returns to Buenos Aires and faces a legacy that includes family businesses and her rivalry with her brothers. I am Marco, a famous model, Sofia’s friend and party partner.
-Did they record it in a pandemic?
-Yes, we shot it in a pandemic, the possibility of producing again was just opened and it was a new and strange return, with a lot of protocol, chinstrap. It was not easy to play my character in those circumstances, there was a lot of uncertainty, there were no vaccines. It was all very weird.
-In the end of love, instead, your character is closer to you, right?
-He is a different character, the most hetero normative of the series. He had other challenges, closer to what I know, and the challenge was to find an empathy with the public. He played the boyfriend of Lali’s character, whom he leaves in the first chapter and is the premise of his search. a little bit ghostingHe doesn’t understand anything and wants to know what’s going on. He also has his transformation and questions what he wants for his life and tries to empathize with his ex.
-What was it that attracted you to this proposal?
-I like how he challenges young people and older people and how he makes us question and rethink what we were taught as children and our beliefs. What generates the most are questions and makes you stay debating with friends. It’s a good starting point to talk about topics that were taboo for a long time. It is the story of Tamara, a girl raised within an Orthodox Jewish community, who confronts her upbringing and her culture. Fede, my character and her boyfriend, accustomed to the predictability of the relationship, is completely out of place in the face of the profound changes that Tamara experiences.
What are your plans for next year?
-I am writing and developing projects for 2023. There are nice things, but not yet closed.
-Do you like to write?
-I’m lovin ‘it. It is a good complement that works for me and a cathartic exercise that keeps my creativity active when it comes to continuing to compose characters. It’s something I discovered in a pandemic. I had already done a year of scriptwriting in Patricio Vega’s laboratory and I got caught up and invested my free time in writing and it did me good.
-You started at 17 years old in Ugly DucklingWere you aware of what you were doing or was it out of curiosity?
-I wasn’t conscious at all, I wanted to see what it was about. I entered that unknown world out of curiosity and little by little I began to like it. I learned to act by recording. He had done theater at school, but no more than that. Over time I got hooked, I started studying theater with Mónica Bruni, who is my teacher today and I fell in love with theater. Alejandro Stoessel called me, producer of Ugly Ducklingbecause he had seen me in the school musical, I did the casting in Ideas del Sur and stayed. It was a character that was going to be in a few chapters because I also went to school double shift and I couldn’t be recording at two in the afternoon, but I got hooked, I juggled so as not to be free, I spoke with the preceptor, and I invited the granddaughter Let’s see Duckling… to the theater so that I wouldn’t pass the faults.
-You bought it!
-Yes… (laughs) I did a barter. I was not free, but still I ended up taking almost all the subjects because I was only a good student in December, when I studied and did well, but during the year it was a disaster. I was able to finish high school and at the same time continue working. Over time I understood the responsibility I had.
-Did you study another career?
-I went for a year to study different artistic branches in the United States. As a child I understood that I wanted to go for something that had to do with creativity and I was trained in that field and I continue to do so today. Luckily my parents bankrolled me on that one.
-You lived five years in Italy, how was the experience for you?
-I left in 2012 for Ugly Duckling Y spoiled because in Italy they were a boom and they called me to promote the series and then they contacted me to do ballando con le stelle. I don’t know how to dance, but if they tell me what to do, I’ll do it, so I learned all the choreographies.
-You learned so well that you were champion…
-Yes (laughs), I decided to stay and study Italian and theater. I got a good school in Rome, I started doing auditions and they called me to join a RAI novel called Don Matteo and has been on the air for 14 years. It stars Terrence Hill, who is the actor in the spaghetti western from the ’60s and is very famous in Italy. I was there for two years and it was a beautiful experience. Later I did another novel called God help us. I was lucky to be able to live in Italy working as an actor and it was an unforgettable experience. To record, I would go to the Colosseum every day.
-Why did you come back?
-Because I missed the things that you think you don’t pay attention to when you’re here. The simplest and most everyday things like drinking mate with my friends and family. I was missing the social part. In Italy, that Argentine identity that I didn’t know I had was awakened in me.. I was going to listen to tangos somewhere and here it would never have occurred to me. I was moved by anything that reminded me of Buenos Aires. I realized that I wanted to go back, that I gave more importance to my friends and my family. And I also became a boyfriend while there.
-With the actress Candela Vetrano, did they get engaged from a distance?
-No, we were introduced by a mutual friend. Cande went to Rome for a festival for a few days, they stayed to sleep at my house, I took the opportunity to act as a tour guide, we hit it off and started dating. Shortly after I returned to Argentina for a job, I was a month and since then we have not separated. It was like seven years ago. I returned to Italy to finish recording and without work commitments, the return operation began.
-That incipient love survived the distance…
We survived, yes. At first it was difficult to be away, especially since we were building the relationship. Luckily we are very well and we have lived together for a few years. In the end of love We had the chance to work together, we did a scene as brothers-in-law because Cande plays Lali’s sister. It was weird because I had to look at her as family and not as my girlfriend. We had already done a micro-theater, where I played John Lennon and she played Yoko Ono, a very funny parody.
-Was it difficult to return to work in our country after five years in Italy?
-I had to take a few steps back, but I knew it was going to happen. It was a nice journey to reconnect with my country, to perform again in my language because that connects you from another side and is more enriching. There the characters were more limited, above all because of the accent. I studied a lot of Italian to do native characters, I had reached a level where they told me I could do them, but I just decided to come back, and I’m happy to have come back.
-Don’t you regret it?
-We all have complaints, but Argentina has incredible human and creative potential. There are very talented people and I bet we can move things forward together. We must stop saying that the problem is in the other and take care of what corresponds to us. I put my grain of sand from where it belongs to me. Our industry has the power to break it anywhere in the world.