The Czech actress Jenovéfa Boková (26) plays a girl-next-door in the drama Moments. She portrays Anežka, who is crushed by relationships and doesn’t know how to take the initiative or say no. Boková – known mainly from the miniseries Burning Bush and Revival along with the feature Family Film – says she would like to play “a bitch” for a change. But that won’t be easy.
Director Beata Parkanová allegedly looked for someone “authentic and intense” for the role of Anežka. Did you have to prove it was you?
Beata found me. She wrote to me saying she had a script and had me in mind. We met over the script about a year before shooting started. Actually she told me she didn’t want anyone else and I knew I wanted to do it because the film is literally built on actors and my character of Anežka. I didn’t want to watch the original short film that Moments is based on.
Did you shoot the individual “moments” chronologically?
Yes, the shooting took place over the course of nine months, always for three or five days in a row and then a two week break. Each “moment” – or rather Anežka’s encounter with another character – was made in one piece, linearly. That was great for me because I knew precisely where Anežka was and I didn’t have to adjust to a different situation every time.
Anežka often does what she doesn’t want to do and is unable to say what she needs. Was she close to you in that respect?
Not at all. We are totally different, for me it was a counter-role. If something bugs me, I say it. And very quickly. Our family is open as well, we tell each other things immediately. A few times she really annoyed me but at the same time I understood her because I know a lot of people who are like her. I understood that some people are simply stuck in their feelings.
Read more on how the film was made, what happened when the actress overslept for a shoot for the first time and why directors always cast her as “the good girl” in Jan Škoda’s interview in Tuesday’s Festival Daily.
