He is Argentinian, he moved to Iceland and found a job on True Detective: “It was a great experience”

“Mayonnaise. Make a lot of it, people. Don’t skimp. Do you want to see the final product?” asks the biophysicist Molina, the character of Pablo Frana, at the beginning of the first episode of True Detective: Night Country. The fourth season of the hit 2014 series premiered on Sunday, January 14 HBO AND HBO Max.

The native of Junin is perhaps the Argentine actor who has uttered the word “mayonnaise” the most times in the history of HBO.

His emphasis on the popular Minorcan salsa is justified: a few scenes later, the agent he plays Jodie Foster He deduces from the condiment – ​​“it looks like syrup,” he says – how many days have passed since Molina/Frana prepared the sandwich.

Part I: True Detective

Even viewers who didn’t finish the episode saw Landslide’s scene. Her character, who is part of the trigger for the plot, appears before the first five minutes of the programme.

That’s why online – and on his phone – many Argentinians underlined how proud they were of his surprise appearance in the most important television premiere of the year.

“It was just that, an apparition,” Frana tells Clarín from her Icelandic apartment where she can see the Northern Lights through the window.

Although he only appears for a few seconds, his character has dialogue in English and Spanish and his face is later seen in photos.

In the fourth season of True Detective, developed in six episodes and with a plot completely independent from those of the other three, the detectives Liz Danvers (Foster) e Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) investigate the disappearance of eight men from the Tsalal Arctic station. One of these is Molina.

-How did you get to True Detective?

-He introduced me to an agency. First they asked me: “Would you be interested in doing a casting?” It was something short, but never done here in Iceland. And I said no, I don’t know why. But then they sent me the script and I thought it was funny, I had to improvise.

Of the casting, the 38-year-old actor described: “I lived in a room that had a small window facing the wall. I went to buy a sandwich at the supermarket (it had to be something with a sandwich), I made three. Well, the director liked it, they said yes and that was it.”

The filming, which took place entirely in Iceland, was a dream. “It was really fun, it was a huge, huge experience,” she emphasizes. “It was very productive in many ways. But above all from a human point of view. Humility. They behaved in the same way as someone who says ‘Hi’ or appears in profile and that’s what stuck with me the most.”

Frana worked for nine days on a giant set. Apart from a couple of technical trips to England, she practically hasn’t had to leave home. That’s why she was able to continue working in the hotel where she lives today.

The director, the Mexican Issa Lopez, treated him “as if he were a normal actor. “He didn’t make any difference.”

The day of the mayonnaise scene Pablo had to improvise and repeat the take eight or nine times. In all of them she said more or less the same dialogue.

When he said the dialogue, those behind the cameras laughed and told him to continue “like this.” López, who directed speaking in English, approached him to give him directions in his native language. This helped him see things “from another side” and refine the character’s tone.

“It was very fun, very enjoyable, I didn’t feel any pressure at any point. “It was really, really good,” acknowledges the actor.

Pablo had only slept two hours that day, as he had been working in the hotel all night. Four months earlier they had proposed to him to participate in the night reception and he, knowing that “it was a bad idea” but thirsty for adventure, let himself be carried away by the idea of ​​living a new experience and accepted.

“A month later I was on True Detective and I said, ‘This is going to be a problem.’ And yes, indeed. Two days before filming I worked all night and slept for two hours. It was a zombie“, He admitted.

The production allowed him to study only the scenes in which he finally appears (beyond the occasional extras who helped him fit into the context).

Since they never told him what the story was about, the job required him to give it his all: “As an actor you have to imagine it, put a lot of yourself into it.. You don’t know what the overall context of the larger scene is. Today’s context is just this.”

-Have you met Jodie Foster?

-Yes, the last day of filming. We talked for two seconds. A divine, normal. He recognized me as Molina. The day I saw her, that is when López wanted to say goodbye, I didn’t know that I would meet her, so I didn’t take her phone and I couldn’t take a photo. She was there on set.

Of course: even if he didn’t speak for long with the star of the program, he gave a gift to the Argentine people a shot shared between Lionel Messi and the protagonist of The Silence of the Lambs.

In one shot, Foster stands in front of a refrigerator with photos of the station’s scientists. One of these is that of Molina/Frana dressed in the Argentina shirt, next to the image of the national team’s ten.

In short, the filming was very calm and “organic”. Pablo got along very well with the cast, mostly made up of women from Alaska, London and Canada, and even went out for drinks with the entire production team.

Part II: Iceland

Pablo was born in Azul, Buenos Aires province, although he grew up in Junín. He also lived in Palermo, CABA. He is an art teacher with theater orientation. He works on what he has studied, but also in the reception of an Icelandic hotel.

He arrived in Iceland from Italy about two years ago. For three months he has been living in the apartment whose window overlooks the Reykjavik sky. However, even if the destination he has chosen is exotic and he arrived there from another European territory, Pablo is not a globetrotter.

-How did you come to live in Iceland?

-It was my sister’s idea. During the pandemic I returned to Junín and she was in Australia. She told me that she would apply for Italian citizenship and that I would accompany her, and I went. I lived there for 3 or 4 months. There weren’t many job opportunities at that time. It was Iceland or Norway working on whatever. So they hired us from here and we came from Italy.

“I decided to go to Iceland not because I wanted to explore, but because of the present of our country, which was not very promising out there. Which hurts me a lot,” he reflects.

“My sister said to me, ‘Try something else, I got out of there, I had another experience.’ I left Argentina thinking I wouldn’t return.. Leaving was a bit of a disappointment from this point of view. Iceland was chosen because we were coming out of COVID and there weren’t many options“commented.

“Why didn’t I stay in Italy or go to Spain? Because it’s more or less the same as Argentina in terms of work environment. I lived as an actor and model in Italy, as a conventional worker hospitality… It’s as if here (in Iceland) we recognize other types of things, which I personally, in Argentina, from another point of view, have not experienced so much.”

-Was it because of a job growth problem?

-In a year I never missed work and they immediately asked me if I wanted to be a supervisor. It had never happened to me to be recognized like this, from my absolutely personal point of view. I send a CV to three schools and all three call you for work. I don’t know the language? “Well, it doesn’t matter, you learn,” they tell you.

Pablo says he taught in several Argentine prisons and that his story when it came to finding work in his home country was “not so easy.” “It’s not that I’m throwing bullshit, far from it, but in my case things are a little better here.”

His first few weeks in Iceland were difficult. His family and friends were “very important” to his adjustment.

“It’s not easy living here. This winter, for example, in the Icelandic context, is beautiful. But to say for the first time that I saw the sun once every three months is already a lot. Wind, rain and snow and so on. Three or four months. The past is a little better, it’s global warming…”

His sister and another brother also live in Iceland. Pablo began his career in that country working in the breakfast area of ​​the hotel where he continues to stay.

Meanwhile, he sent in resumes to work as an art teacher and was accepted “on the spot.” She did the same to him coil and portfolio of his work as an actor and model, which is why he ended up doing, among other things, commercials for Italy and the aforementioned stellar appearance in True Detective.

-Is Iceland expensive?

–It’s expensive, yesalthough it is totally different from Argentina in relation to how much you can save or not. Here you will savehaving the job you have.

-What impact did the Grindavik volcano eruption have on your home?

-All precautions are taken here, but there is no madness of “we will all die”, nothing to do with that. If you get closer than 15 km you can see the smoke.

We recall that a few days ago the Grindavik volcano erupted for the second time in less than a month, destroying houses and forcing the government to evacuate 4,000 people. The city is located 40 kilometers from the capital.

In the two years he has resided in Iceland, Pablo has experienced three eruptions. Twice 20 kilometers from his house and now. “The previous days, and even more so the previous (volcano), when cracks appeared in the city, everything moved”.

-How do you see yourself in the next few years?

-For at least another year I will definitely live here, but with the desire to return to Argentina. I’m more comfortable. The adaptation is now a little easier than last year and the year before, which I was anxious about. But you get used to it. Family is important.

After his performance in True Detective, Pablo would like to work in his country. “Confidently!“, he exclaims when faced with this possibility, while specifying that at the moment he doesn’t want to leave his job in the hotel for anything in the world: “I feel very good and it puts my feet on the ground”.