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QUESTION:
You were born 1946 in Graz, weren´t you?
HGN:
Yes. On February 20th. At 6.30 p.m. In constellation pisces with ascendent virgin.
QUESTION:
Do you believe in that?
HGN:
In my birth? I think so, at least up to a point.
QUESTION:
Don´t you trust the reality?
HGN:
On the contrary. I doubt only my ability to recognize it´s complexity completely.
QUESTION:
Striktly speaking my last but one question referred to the astrology.
HGN:
I see. All right, I find this belongs to the numerous and fascinating appearances of our evolution just as the cave painting, religions, renaissance palaces, cellphones, computer or the stringtheorie. With all this works we describe our desires which unfold due to our perception and cry for shaping. I regard each vehicle of equal man is using for his search for truth.
QUESTION:
Are you what one calls generally religious?
HGN:
Not in a conventional sense I suppose. Faith and agnosticism aren´t incompatible contrasts to me, but only two sides of a coin. Though there exists a view of life influencing me increasingly. An american female Zenmaster (Charlotte Joko Beck) educates it all interested humans of the western culture in a understandable and humorously way. Failing daily in buddhist premisses by practizing Zazen I experience something that is very important for me. But you cant understand that if you haven´t occupied yourself with it already and you can´t really put it into words. So I suggest to change the subject.
QUESTION:
Agreed. Lets return to your biographical facts. Have you been a good pupil?
HGN:
Unfortunately not. Even at the primary school lacking each readiness to work I darkened all my parents hope on a glorious future in a high position like as a medical doctor, architect, secretary of state or at least an university lecturer.
QUESTION:
Incredible in view of your intelligence and talent.
HGN:
Probably it was a behavior of refusal. Obviously I didn´t see another option to defend a method of instruction which worked by causing fear, especially since it was prefered by a mayority of teachers at that time.
QUESTION:
That sounds terrible.
HGN:
Seen from the viewpoint of a young creative mind it has been so as well.
QUESTION:
Why has this been so in your opinion?
HGN:
Only few years ago a horrifying worldwar and the terrorregime of Nazis happened and shakened many survivors to the core. I felt this atmosphere of a barrak square very seriously in the secondary school emphasizing classical lanquages, it´s every day live done in such a way became a sharp contrast to it´s mental aims. Although there were already then quite a few women and even men which didn´t enforce their authority by yelling but in a natural way by virtue of their wisdom and the skill to impart their students a pleasure for knowledge. This minority was regarded as too much gentle inside the hierachy of the faculty. Definitely they represented a counterforce for me, supporting me not to despair already beforehand.
QUESTION:
1969 you joined the Max Reinhard Seminar of Vienna.
HGN:
Yes. For becoming an actor. It was a very creative, exiting period, we claimed a dimension of liberty prior generations didn´t dare to imagine even. To seek out sozial contradictions and to examine each authority became part of our agenda to a certain extent, on the other hand we enjoyed prosperity and additional in Europe a long period of peace. I think it was the french filmdirector Godard who characterized us as „the generation between Marx and Coca Cola.“
QUESTION:
Did you have your usual troubles with the teachers of this famous actorschool?
HGN:
No. For the first time I didn´t refuse more longer but did concentrate my mind on the manner listening attentively. Our teachers at that time were women and men of practice, successful and honored actors. That belongs to the attractions of our profession. Only the best artists are able to be also the best teachers.
QUESTION:
When did this enthusiasm for the theater end?
HGN:
Never. It´s my artistic parental home in which I´m fond of returning any time.
QUESTION:
However, you didn´t do this for a prolonged period. You prefer the play in front of a camera.
HGN:
It´s correct. At present it is like that.
QUESTION:
Why actual?
HGN:
All right, film has been always a big challenge for me, because it forces me to be truthful.
The eye of a camera is incorruptable and requires a inner discreetness, just a breathing human´s conception of himself. As audiance doesn´t recognize me performing a fictive character but does consider me showing only private emotions than I´ve done my work well.
QUESTION:
Does this mean that each perfect interpretation is based on a fundamental missunderstanding between audiance and actor?
HGN (laughing):
It sounds so well so that I tend to agree. But seriously spoken you deal probably rather with a illiusion both sides have agreed tacitly. Apart from the fact anyway I´m not important as a private individual to the audiance during my interpretation, only the character I represent is. Seen in that way this missunderstanding, even in case of existing, would be meaningless concerning the publik forming of an truthful moment.
QUESTION:
All you´ve told about dramatic art applies not only to film but also to theater, doesn´t it?
HGN:
I agree enthusiastic with your supposition though most of all a history stage compells in association with it´s auditorium other techniques than such ones which make possible a discreet play in front of a close running camera. From there it is most remarkable, if an actor is able to create nowadays a comparable intimacy on theater too.
QUESTION:
Have theater and film become irreconcilable contrasts or are they able to have a positive influence on each other?
HGN:
At the begin of the past century the film was born as a child of the theater. Now it is grown up and in the flower of it´s existence. Perhaps it should take care of his parents being in poor health.
QUESTION:
Do you think filmartists should also work in the theater?
HGN:
Yes. Why not? A few are doing it already. On no account both medium should confront each other face to face as irreconcilable enimies. They belong to the same family.
QUESTION:
1991 you performed convincingly the title role in the socially critical TV-production „Hansi Vrba“ which caused a stir. Shortly after it you wrote for the first time a screenplay for the series EUROCOPS and played also a leading role in this sequence.
HGN:
Yes, I´ve got the chance to do that. At first I only intended to draft a part for me and to hope unsophisticatedly a wrighting profis would implement my ideas in an appropriate way. But that didn´t happen. So I had to learn how to do the work by myself. It was marvelous because so I expierienced an extention of horizon on an unexpected scale.
QUESTION:
But writing wasn´t completley new to you. You did it already 10 years before as you realized two own theaterproductions about „Francois Villon“ and then „James Dean“.
HGN:
Those ainly were collages of already existing literature, a bit completed by my own scripts. And my focus remained very egocentrically then, directed only towards these both extraordinary characters. You can´t compare that really with the much more extensive work for a movie.
QUESTION:
Anyway you´ve been very successful in Vienna till your „emigration“. Why did you move 1995 to Munich?
HGN:
I considered it to be a necessary challenge I didn´t like to avoid. This city is just the way the german filmcapital.
QUESTION:
Coincidence rewarded your decision at the latest in the year 2000 when you were engaged there for the Steven Spielberg/Tom Hanks-Production „Band of Brothers“ which was awarded with 2 Golden Globes and a lot of Emmys a year later for being the best television series.
HGN:
Yes. Working in the „liga of worldchampigons“ was a great pleasure for me, although it hasn´t been a coincidence. Hollywood doesn´t throw the dice. A lot of actors had been casted in front of a running camera for this episode, not until then the decision was made.
QUESTION:
Do you write further more screenplays?
HGN:
Yes. At the moment I’m outlining two new filmprojects. Extra - so to say in my spare time - I’m working on a novel and it´s transformation into a serial.
QUESTION:
What does it deal about?
HGN:
It´s a fiction starting in the year 2087 and ending 500 years later on a planet being similar to earth. Called „Beyond the Light“ it deals with a escape from earth, a multigenerationflight and finally the colonization of a new world.
QUESTION:
2007 you were trained in the New York Film Academy as a director, weren’t you?
HGN:
Yes. In La Femis Paris.
QUESTION:
Did you take an exam there?
HGN:
Days and nights constantly. The whole workshop was an exam. It was as well mentally as physically an exhausting and phantastic time.
QUESTION:
Did you get after finishing some certificate?
HGN:
After presenting my Final Short „DUSK“ I got a diploma. But the decisive fact is that I have got qualifications to shoot films professionally.
QUESTION:
Is it possible to see your first work?
HGN:
Possible. Just I intend to present „DUSK“ worldwide on festivals.
QUESTION:
It was not a ordinary decision to become a student again in your age. Wy did you make up your mind to that?
HGN:
Because I had developed a late but undiminished interest for filmdirecting. So truely I had no other choice.
QUESTION:
Were there other older students too?
HGN:
No. I was the only one who put silly ideas into his head briefly before my retirement.
QUESTION:
How was it to learn again together with young people? Did you meet a generation you didn’t understand really?
HGN:
Not at all. It was like riding a timemachine to return back into my student days but this time registering another subject. Basically there doesn`t change any. Either you have the creative desire and the skill or not. It´s a question of intuition which is accompanied by hard work.
QUESTION:
Do you have already a concrete project for the future?
HGN:
Actually four. But I keep silent about that currently.
QUESTION:
Which colour do you like most?
HGN:
Red.
QUESTION:
Which painter is your favourite?
HGN:
Marc Chagall.
QUESTION:
Which writer?
HGN:
Franz Werfel.
QUESTION:
Which composer?
HGN
Not only just since 2006 but already from my early childhood on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is it.
QUESTION:
When it will be possible to watch your first feature film?
HGN:
That´s in the lap of the gods at the moment.
QUESTION:
By which we´ve arrived at astrology again.
HGN:
Correct. The circle has closed.
QUESTION:
Hans Georg Nenning, thank you for this conversation.
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