Miquel Fernández: "Culturally, we Catalans are embarrassed to say that we are good"

BarcelonaMiquel Fernández (Barcelona, 1980) has a long career in theater, cinema, and television. He has appeared in series such as Nit i dia, La Riera, Cites, Benvinguts a la família and Fariña and has demonstrated his talent as a singer in various musicals and the contest Tu cara me suena, which he won. Now, however, he takes on one of the biggest challenges of his career: playing Ferran Adrià inGènesi, the series about the gastronomic revolution that El Bulli represented. In addition to Fernández's performance, another of the production's assets is around seventy of El Bulli's most iconic dishes, which were cooked specifically for the filming. This Monday, the fiction, which Adrià wants to be "the best culinary series in history," premieres at the San Sebastián Festival and is released on TV3 and 3Cat. Later, Netflix will distribute it in Spain, Latin America, and the United States.

In Gènesi you play Ferran Adrià, who is a person the general public is very familiar with. How did you work on the character?

— Obviously, the main thing was not to fall into parody. In the six chapters there is an evolution: the Ferran who enters El Bulli is not the one everyone knows. He was not this expansive person with so much confidence, and who has magnetism when he speaks. At the beginning he was a very introverted person, with a brutal humility and who did not know what to do. There is a lot of evolution and I had to do something real and credible. First I needed to imitate the character and, from there, deconstruct, never better said. Then I had to create something credible that had the peculiarity of his way of chatting and communicating. For me he is a super admirable person, I was amazed. I love his authenticity and I think he was like that since he left the Santa Eulàlia neighborhood.

Initially, you auditioned for a different character and they ended up asking you to do the screen tests to play Ferran Adrià. What did you think when they made the proposal to you?

— Sometimes I am quite an unconscious person and I go all out. I have been dedicated to this for many years and if I do it, it is because I want to evolve and do things that pose a challenge and this, obviously, was one. I thought "I have to work hard on this, it has to be mine". I always say the same thing and it doesn't always happen [laughs]. The first character I auditioned for was Santi Santamaria. At that moment, I had a beard and I suppose they saw me and thought I could fit. Later my agent called me and said: "They want you for Santi Santamaria, but they also want to see you to play Ferran".

During the process, you have had contact with Adrià. He has an almost unstoppable personality, how did you manage it?

— I was very nervous, because I didn't realize its magnitude until I started studying it. When I saw the dimension it has in the world, I said "watch out". The day of the interview with him I was very nervous, but I usually hide my nerves well and act like nothing is happening. I asked him many questions for an hour and I recorded it. Every day, before starting the filming, I would play the recording, as if it were a mantra. I would go in the car listening to it. I created a dictionary, which I call the Ferrandiari, where I put the script texts written as he speaks. For example, the correct thing would be to say "I would have to", but he says "if you were to". I also wrote everything phonetically. There came a moment when I started speaking like him and I would make audios that I sent to my friends or my family. Depending on the reaction they had, I knew if I was on the right track or not.

One of the slogans repeated in the first episode regarding work in the kitchen is "enthusiasm, passion and obsession". Is this mantra also applicable to acting?

— It is applicable to everything. What I have learned from the people who have been helping to make the series is the brutal capacity for work, order, rigor, and effort. And all of this can be extrapolated to the work of an actor. In fact, if it is not like that, it makes no sense. Now, we already know that there are projects and projects, and sometimes you put more into it or you put less into it.

In the presentation of the series, Ferran Adrià argued that Catalan cuisine has not known how to sell itself to the world and that it was very important to do this marketing work. You actors also have to do a lot of this work. How is this managed?

— I don't know if we are selling ourselves or exposing ourselves. There are few actors who know how to sell themselves as Ferran understands it. Culturally, Catalan society, and also Spanish society, doesn't know how to do it. On the other hand, Anglo-Saxons do. We are ashamed to talk about ourselves, we are ashamed to say that we are good. I have it, I can't help it. It's not something I've learned, it's as if it were in my genes. It's very hard for me to say: "I've done the best work of my life and they should give me a Goya". Now I'm hearing myself and I'm ashamed. I spent a month in Los Angeles because I did an American movie and I was at a table with fourteen agents. They were selling themselves to see who would be my agent: "This guy is a piece of shit, I'm better than him". I was blown away. Do you know which one I picked? The one I liked the most. He is still my manager, even though I don't do anything in the United States. Every now and then, he calls me and says "How are you, Miquel?". It is very curious to see how they sell themselves in other countries, here we don't do it, not a chance. And actors even less so. We haven't got a damn clue and it's not the style. Besides, surely if you did it they would tell you that you are arrogant. It's complicated, unless you are Javier Bardem, Luis Tosar, or Eduard Fernández. Better to shut up because they will label you as full of yourself. If we talk about social media, things are already different. For me, social media is an unnecessary exhibition, even if the world is going that way.

You have a very long career, but at the same time a quite comfortable and manageable level of fame. Is this good for your profession?

— I think so. I am very happy being number five, I am very happy going to a restaurant and having no one say anything to me or, if they do say something, it is "hey, you do it so well". I can lead a normal life and, on the other hand, I have colleagues and peers who cannot. I do not envy that possibility at all.

This must also mean you don't have a very distinct profile.

— Let's see how this marks me, if I play Ferran for my whole life [laughs].