I was at the entrance to a theater near Plaça de les Glòries when I thought “that boy has to be an actor.” He was not acting in the play that night but his bearing, his curly hair, his bright eyes had that indescribable quality that a casting director could distinguish in an ocean of people. That impression was left there when the speakers warned that the performance was about to begin and that attendees had to sit in their seats. When Prime Video and 3Cat announced the broadcast of L’Acadèmia, a Brutal Media production, there was that kid who looked like a star. It is Ton Vieira, who at 22 years old already has his first leading role: Jairo, the young promise of Apolo F.C. football, little accustomed to discipline but with extraordinary control of the ball.
What were your impressions upon receiving the role of Jairo?
At first I was very happy because I hadn’t worked for months. When I was seeing what the character would be like, I was a little scared. It has been a challenge, starting from the accent. And I was afraid. Little by little, however, I began to enter and get rid of these fears, which are part of the job.
What do you talk at home?
Catalan is the family language. My father is from Brazil and at home Portuguese and Catalan are spoken, especially Catalan, since my mother is from Barcelona.
So, Jairo’s accent…
I had never imitated the Colombian accent. Luckily, he had just filmed the third season of Hit, where he played a canary, so he had been trained to do an accent different from mine. It’s something that I like a lot. I wish the next projects were a little like this: beyond the challenge, which motivates and is exciting, it is very cool for the creation of the characters. It helped me put myself in a very different place from mine and get closer to Jairo’s situation. I did research on the language, I found out about the accent, the dialects that exist in Colombia, and I watched Colombian series. It led me to discover a reality different from mine.
On an interpretive level, your key dynamic in L’Acadèmia is with Marc Soler, your roommate in fiction. What was it like working together?
We understand each other very well with Marc. We have very different ways of working, but at the same time we have similarities. Marc is a much more active guy. We really wanted to work and we had just finished filming and we were going to the beach to work on the scripts: before starting filming we were already working on it. The obsession with work, from a positive point of view, went very well for us.
What reaction have you had from the public?
Our work is about representing realities very different from ours. I could understand that my signing generated controversy, that the Colombian actors could be upset. What was in my hands was to treat the role with respect and professionalism, and in the process of creating Jairo I was in contact with a Colombian actor. It is true that the series has not premiered in Colombia but I have been in contact with people there and the impressions I have obtained are very positive.
Benidorm, Hit, L’Acadèmia… anyone would say that having a certain skin color marks the profile of the characters you play on television.
Completely. It’s something that happens in the industry. They have a tendency to label you based on your physique, your skin color… I am aware that this happens and it is a reality. But, first of all, what I feel is gratitude for what I interpreted. My way of changing these industry customs is to show that I can do anything. I’m not in a hurry to prove it either. I’m 22 years old. And I have a lot of fun playing a conflicted character. Challenges motivate. And not all my roles have been like this.
For example?
At the Teatre Lliure de Gràcia I did the play El cine where I had an introverted character, with Asperger’s: a cinema enthusiast, zero conflict, who was a child’s love. He looked nothing like Jairus. By this I mean that my experience is that I receive opportunities to do other things. I get various castings. But, if we look at what I have done so far, I almost always play the stigmatized character: the conflictive one, the one who comes from abroad, the one who has emigrated from his country. It’s the problem of the industry: we close everyone in little boxes. But the new generations are changing: we don’t want to continue working like this. We new generations demand a change.
And what can you tell me about the third season of Hit, which has been in a Rtve drawer since it was filmed at the end of 2022?
We don’t know why the third season isn’t broadcast. Our colleagues have a group, we send each other articles, what is published about it, but we don’t know what happens. It is a series that works well, which has managed to produce a third season, which is not easy at all. It has an audience and it is a shame that it is not released because it has a very powerful message. The pending season is set in a psychiatric center and is approached without taboos, because Joaquín Oristrell has courage, he risks everything.
At the moment, you have 11,000 followers on Instagram, which are not yet influencer figures. Are you worried about the weight that social networks have on the careers of young actors?
It worries me that they are given so much value. I use them only as a work tool because they are requested of me: they are so present in our lives that they are required to promote projects. But I don’t do this for the show, for the fame, but to get on stage, to film, for rehearsals. And I’m not in a hurry: I see my career as a long-distance race.
