The accidental actress - Croatian actress Aleksandra Vujcic - Interview

Interview, May, 1997 by Jil Derryberry

Aleksandra Vujcic didn't wait for the movies to come to her - fact is, she wasn't even expecting them. Luckily for us, they found her

One of the pitfalls of celebrity journalism is that it's often forgotten there are real people behind the hype. Aleksandra Vujcic is a reminder: one who happens to look like the long lost star of a '60s jet-set movie, or the girl that James Bond never met. Discovered in a New Zealand bar a little over a year ago, the twenty-four-year-old Croatian-born actress makes a storming debut in Broken English, which is released here this month.

Vujcic is Nina, the baby in a family of Croatians that has taken refuge in the melting pot of contemporary Auckland. There, she takes a Maori as a lover, leading to increasingly violent confrontations with her rigidly Old World father (Rade Serbedzija). It's Vujcic's rawly sensual performance as the impetuous Nina that gives this melodramatic movie its urgency. "I really didn't think I'd find the right actress," says Broken English director Gregor Nicholas. "But when I met Aleksandra, it was unmistakable that she was someone who couldn't betray herself in front of the lens. She is so emotionally true."

JIL DERRYBERRY: Lana Turner was reportedly discovered at a soda fountain. You, being a few years older than she was, were discovered in a bar.

ALEKSANDRA VUJCIC: Yes. I was drinking with friends in Auckland on St. Patrick's Day The casting director happened to be there and she watched me for a long, long time. She told me the story of Broken English and invited me to audition. I didn't consider it a huge thing. [shrugging] So they were making a movie. I was happy where I was at the moment.

JD: Being an actress wasn't your dream then?

AV: No. I was always a big movie fan but I never felt I needed to take that course. As it turned out, the movies found me.

JD: And once you were cast, the film began to change, right?

AV: The script changed drastically. Gregor Nicholas, the director, was very interested in my experiences during the war, st) we rewrote the story together to include them. All of Nina's war stories are taken from my own personal diary. Nina's meeting a Serbian tank on the railway track - that was something I did.

JD: In the opening voiceover to Broken English, you said that your "shelter" had been the one you created in your own mind. What did you mean by that?

AV: What I wanted to say was, "Nothing can protect me if I am in a [bomb] shelter because that shelter is just one thin wall; it can go whenever." During the war, I would be out partying with my friends when the sirens were going off, Being in a shelter with a bunch of frightened people just made me more depressed and mad.

JD: Did telling your story through Broken English help you to put the war behind you?

AV: It was like I was getting rid of it, yes. When it was happening, I didn't want to think of what had occurred yesterday, of how many bombs fell that day, or whether something would happen to me tomorrow. I just lived in the moment. The war was like a test - like everything in life is - but an extreme test. My choice was to avoid fear.

JD: And after the '94 ceasefire you went to New Zealand.

AV: Yes, I just wanted to go, like the people who came to America with nothing but their suitcases. My father said, "If I was your age, I'd do the same." [laughs] And New Zealand was as far away as I could get. I was happy that I didn't know anyone when I arrived. New Zealand is multicultural, and if you have cultural baggage from your own country, if you don't allow yourself to embrace things that are different, I can see how unhappy you could become. And I don't believe in such a thing as pure blood. My own family is mixed - my father is Serbian, my mother Croatian-Slovenian.

JD: There's a Maori word that's used a lot in Broken English -

AV: Whakapapa! In Maori, that is the one thing that symbolizes your family, your ancestors, your whole background. When Julian's character is carrying his tree - his whakapapa - through the streets to bring it to Nina, it seems exaggerated, but that tree has a spiritual meaning for him. And it's quite normal for someone in love to bring his whakapapa to his Juliet. [laughs]

JD: Let's pretend you'd stayed home that night the casting agent discovered you. What would you be doing now?

AV: Bungee-jumping. [laughs] I really don't know. I couldn't predict that this movie would have ever happened to me in my life, so I can't say, What if?

JD: So if not this movie, life would have brought you something else?

AV: It's like the Doors sang [sings], "Take it easy, baby, take it as it comes." I love that.