Interview with Maria Fernanda Cândido: “Brazil has a lot, a lot of potential”

Maria Fernanda Candido She is a woman of much action and few words. These are the characteristics that she says she shares with Vicência Santos, a character she plays in “Fantastic Beasts: Dumbledore’s Secrets”new universe movie “Harry Potter”which opens this Thursday (14), in Brazilian cinemas.

Vicencia is the Minister of Magic of Brazil and is running for the position of Supreme Chief of the International Confederation of Wizards in this story. A serious and strong woman, in the words of the actress, who plays a central role in the unfolding of the plot of the third feature in the series “Fantastic Beasts”.

Like her, the actress says she is a “democratic” person who “values ​​knowledge”.

After becoming a well-known name in Brazil through theater, film and television, Maria Fernanda Cândido embarks on her first project worthy of Hollywood. The opportunity, however, was only revealed to him after the first tests, due to the high confidentiality of the production.

“At the time of the audition, I still didn’t know what movie it was. It’s ultra confidential. Of course I realized that it was something related to a fantastic universe, because there were elements there that were obviously not part of the real world. But I didn’t even imagine it would be ‘Fantastic Beasts'”, he said in an interview with CNNstating that the character was only revealed after signing a series of clauses.

Once inside the world of magic, Maria Fernanda found herself enchanted by the dimension of a super production like this. One of the most special moments, in her opinion, was when she received her wand, an extremely personal object for every wizard in the narrative of this universe.

It all took place on a recording that was not foreseen in the initial script, and she believed that the wand would be delivered as any other object in the production. But no, there is a whole lot of care by the team.

“It is an artist who makes, who produces these wands, and they are kept in a wooden box, all lined, with little metal plates with the names of the owners of the wand. So, it’s not just an object there, you know? Played anywhere. I really realized that it’s something very special for everyone involved in this work. It was exciting”, he described, revealing a little of the backstage that piques the curiosity of the fans.

The “potterheads”, as the super fans of the literary and film franchise are called, are many and have different ages. What they all have in common is the adoration for the alternate reality constructed by Harry Potter and other characters.

The actress’s children, as it was to be, also watched the films in their childhood, and were excited about the project – so much so that they did not complain about the constant trips that their mother was forced to make on account of the recordings. “They are always complaining that I travel for work, and this time not, they said: ‘Mommy, go easy!’”, she said of the joy of Thomas and Nicolas Spahira, respectively aged 16 and 13.

The actress, who has lived in Paris with her husband and children since 2017, confesses that she has not been able to self-isolate in the last two years.

During the pandemic, in addition to having to stay in England for six months to film “Fantastic Beasts”, he also left for Uruguay, where he participated in the recordings of the Amazon series “El Presidente”, about the life of former FIFA president João Havelange. . Maria Fernanda plays Anna Maria Havelange.

The fear of Covid existed, of course, and she says that she carried out daily tests to know if she had contracted the disease.

“We still haven’t realized what it was all about. The pandemic is not something of the past. (…) We are, of course, in another moment, no longer with that fear of death, there, all day long. But we still have daily deaths. I still wear a mask, alcohol gel. Really, I don’t think the penny of what this was all about has yet sunk in,” he reported.

This reflective way of hers is not something new in the life of the actress, who is a founding partner of Casa do Saber, an educational institution with courses in areas such as psychoanalysis, philosophy and literature. Living on the air bridge between Paris and São Paulo, she continues to participate in all the decisions of the school, which is now completely virtual.

As a “knowledge seeker”, as she says, following the news and being connected to events in Brazil are part of her routine. How does she watch the news?

“I think we are going through a very difficult time, right? This is a great year for us Brazilians, a very important election year, a time for us to really pay attention”, he evaluated, and then celebrated the initiatives to encourage young people from the age of 16 to take their voting cards.

From the perspective of someone who spends most of her time outside the country, she believes that “Brazil has a lot, a lot of potential”.

“We have an impression and a tendency to think that everything from outside is better, is more developed. This is an idealization, this is the result of ideas. Every place has difficulties, every place has its strengths as well. Of course, it’s a process, we need more time to live our maturation. But we are walking.”

In the reality of “Fantastic Beasts”, there is a strong division between wizarding society, and Vicência Santos is one of the central elements of one of the narratives. She opposes a totalitarian government, which preaches an idea of ​​wizarding supremacy over “muggles”, those born without magical powers.

My character is clearly aligned with the most democratic way of thinking. She is a woman of strategy, she is politics. However, she has traces of humanity and sensitivity. All this made me very happy.

Maria Fernanda Candido

She doesn’t believe, however, that the film has a lot of ballast at the moment.

“The film is not a metaphor, it was not made now, it was written many years ago. However, literature drinks from reality. That’s what we’ve been doing for millennia,” he says.

“Human production, artistic and literary production, is based on the world, on facts, on life, on humanity. These are our affairs. So, I think it will resonate, yes, it will reverberate in some way. What is being said in the film will certainly make sense for our reality, for our contemporary.”

Current issues, by the way, insist on permeating the production and dissemination of “Fantastic Beasts: Dumbledore’s Secrets”.

The author of the Harry Potter books, J.K. Rowling, was criticized by netizens and celebrities after complaints about potential transphobia, especially against trans women. The dizzying scenarios were not able to distract the public from the issue, which from time to time resurfaces on networks such as Twitter.

Maria Fernanda Cândido said she could not say whether the controversies affected the production, but said: “I don’t make her words mine. Everyone has the right to think as they wish. But I would not share my thoughts with her.”

The magical universe promises to remain present in the collective imagination for longer. The first book, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone”, was released in 1998, which makes the young wizard’s story 24 years old in 2022 – one of the longest-running franchises in popular culture.

However, for Maria Fernando Cândido, it is impossible to predict the future of the wizarding world.