Norberta(a), a family comedy with dramatic overtones and an LGTBIQ background, has been filmed for almost five weeks. Sonia Escolano, who signs the script, and Belén López make their feature film debut with this project that stars Luis Bermejo and Adriana Ozores. The film is shot in different Catalan locations and today, Monday, the action takes place in the Verdaguer Pavilion, in the Torribera de Santa Coloma de Gramenet complex, a building that is part of a former psychiatric hospital and that now constitutes the nucleus of the campus of Food of Torribera promoted by the University of Barcelona. It is a particularly hot day and there is little left to finish recording. La Vanguardia joins the shooting.
The actors have been working on the film for almost a year: “they called me, I read the script and I thought it was beautiful”, says Adriana Ozores. From then on, joint rehearsals with Luis Bermejo began. “It has a very good structure and today this type of comedy is not so common,” she adds. Despite classifying the film as humorous, the actors explain that it is “full of tenderness” and that it has an “intelligent character that allows the viewer to participate in the story.” “Humor helps to clarify the truth and that is why we want it to be the vehicle,” says Bermejo.
The plot recounts the life of Norberto and María, an elderly, humble couple from the neighborhood who, from time to time, commits a robbery: “There are two Robin Hoods, two Bonnie and Clyde,” explains Luis Bermejo. A confession from Norberto is the one that causes everything to falter and causes a total transformation in the characters. Norbert(a) develops around the couple, their families and their closest friends and is based on the true story of an elderly person who in the eighties decided to change their sex. “There is transition, transformation and humor”, sums up Bermejo.
The background of the film is LGTBIQ, an issue that the team claims to treat with absolute respect and approach from art. “My character comes from loving and wanting a man and now he will be with a woman,” explains Ozores. “The key question is what do I have to feel”, adds the actress who plays a person who doesn’t know how to deal with change. Before, she worked on her characters in a more cerebral way and now she confesses that she trusts and lets herself go: “If you open up to the character, you will be surprised at the ability we have to navigate it.” She adds that “you have to trust something that is beyond” and she remembers that the feeling she had when she saw Norberta, the character played by Bermejo, for the first time has accompanied her throughout the film.
“Living is a constant perplexity of anxiety and moments of joy, but it is possible to transform at any time.” It is the first time that Luis Bermejo makes a total change to play a woman: “Whenever I can, I jump into the abyss without fear of falling,” he confesses. The technical team is especially captivated by the actor’s work and ensures that the role suits him like a glove. “I have always been a highly sensitive person,” he explains tenderly. “I also have my years of therapy, by profession and I try not to drag myself down even if I get very involved in everything I’m doing,” he adds. “Art and creation are disorientation and chaos and, in this disorientation, one suffers just as in love.”
Despite the exhaustion caused by the project and the embarrassment of this July, the protagonists are affectionate with the technical team and the directors. They are completely invested in a film in which they have believed from the first moment and, although the end result will depend on the editing, they are convinced that the starting point is the “jewel” of the script. “Sometimes, we insist on making a good movie from a bad script and it won’t come out because the soul of cinema lies in the script,” concludes Ozores.
