December 2001

TRAILER (530KB) Natalia's greetings in Polish!

photo gallery

Zone Romantica: What have you changed in your life recently?

Natalia Streignard: A country, marital status, television...

R.: What are we going to talk about first?

N.S.: Everything is important and everything has had an impact on my life. I've changed the country because my husband and I split up and I'm not proud of it. It's hard to talk about it. I used to live in Mexico and work for Televisa. After the divorce, I came back to Venezuela. I wanted to be closer to my family and friends. They help me get through this difficult time. I immediately got a job with RCTV. This is also a change as I used to work for Venevision before. I know such changes may help me. New Year – new life! In fact, I'm really satisfied with myself. Thank God, luck is still with me. I've a part in a TV series and I'm doing what I like doing. I live close to my family that I need a lot. Mario and I have remained friends. At least we've managed to save that much.

R.: Venevision had been reporting your wedding ceremony. The entire Latin America watched it.

N.S.: Right. That's why it's so hard to talk about the divorce. The whole world was watching my wedding and then my every step. We were good together and I don't regret anything. We had wonderful moments. I had the time of my life. Unfortunately, it's not always as good as we'd like...

R.: What happened?

N.S.: I can't say I got divorced for any particular reason. I wish I knew a recipe for happiness. It's hard to get along with another person, especially if he does what you do. We both work intensively and it took too much to sacrifice to be together. It's not why we broke up but it certainly influenced our decision. We used to miss each other and finally each of us took their own way. What matters is that I still love him and I'm sure Mario feels the same way about me, too. We keep in touch. It'd be too expensive to call everyday so we talk three times a week. We write e-mails. Mario was here for two weeks and we spent a lot of time together. I can't have a bad word for him. It's extremely important. After divorce, ex-spouses, particularly actors, say nasty things about each other – it's terrible. Maybe one day we'll play in a movie together. Don't get me wrong. I don't know whether we come back together again but life likes to play tricks on us.

R.: Did you part in harmony, no problems with the partition of property?

N.S.: None whatsoever.

R.: How did you do it?

N.S.: It's a secret! We've had property both in Mexico and in Venezuela. Mario stayed in Mexico and I came back here. If I were in need, I'd call Mario and I'm sure he wouldn't refuse to help me.

R.: Did you meet someone?

N.S.: So far, I'm still in the mourning after the last relationship. I dream about a large and happy family. I want to have five children. However, I don't know if I get that lucky. At the moment, the wounds are still bleeding. I'm constantly thinking about Mario. I can't start a new page in a day. I'm going to take my time...

R.: Do you get any help from your relatives?

N.S.: Certainly. I've got a terrific family. God gave me wonderful parents whom I love dearly. It's more and more difficult to find such a good marriage. They've been together for 40 years and they still love each other. I've two brothers and two sisters who already have their own kids. We're all very close and they all feel sorry for me because of my failure. They're always on my side without any conditions.

R.: What do they think of your relationship?

N.S.: They say I got married too soon. I was dating Mario for over a year but at the same time I was doing my TV series. When you play, you live in a different world and forget the reality. We fell in love while working on the series and got married right after the shooting. We hadn't had a chance to get to know each other. I didn't know real Mario and he didn't get to know me well either. No doubt it was love but we rushed into it.

R.: Reportedly, your parents are Europeans.

N.S.: I was born in Madrid. My dad is German, and my Mom comes from Argentina. After the Second World War broke out, Dad went to Argentina. He was a refugee. Met my Mom and soon they got married. He got a job with an international company and started to travel. My sisters were born in Argentina and my brothers in Barcelona. I was born in Madrid. We lived in Ghana, Africa, for three years and then moved to Venezuela. Dad supervised the construction of a dam on the Guri that produces energy for our entire country. Then he set up his own company in Caracas.

R.: So you're rather a Venezuelan?

N.S.: I was born in Spain but before I was three I had lived in Venezuela. I meet the requirement for Venezuelan citizenship: I've been living here for over 15 years. I feel I'm Venezuelan because it's here that I grew up. My home's here and it matters the most. I love this country but if my parents had stayed in Argentina, I'd probably love Argentina. Yet, I can't imagine living outside Venezuela. I've been to the States, I got to like Miami. I liked its community, people...but I had to leave. Just like with Mexico. It's a great city, different from Caracas, but I didn't stand it there. I couldn't imagine myself spending my whole life there.

R.: When did you decide to become an actress?

N.S.: It was rather by accident. I was studying law. Someone stopped me in the street and invited to a casting for a milk commercial. I thought: Sink or swim! I liked the atmosphere on the set. I didn't freeze when I heard “Action!”. I was never afraid of a camera or paralyzed with stage fright. I felt like a fish in a pond. I knew I couldn't blow such a chance. Initially, I worked for TV as a model. When I reached the finals of Miss Venezuela contest, they invited me to the casting for a movie. I landed a leading role in the series for children. Later I got another big role in a Venavision soap opera. Step by step, I got to where I am now.

R.: Many women would like to look like you. Are you happy with your looks?

N.S.: Yes. I'm slim by nature so I don't need to diet to watch my weight. I eat different foods and I don't care. On the other hand, I exercise regularly and take good care of myself, especially during the week. I'm not so careful on the weekend though. If you work so intensively, you sometimes even forget to eat. Besides I don't smoke or have any addictions. It all allows me to keep fit.

R.: What do you think of plastic surgery that is so popular in Venezuela?

N.S.: It is trendy indeed. I've nothing against plastic surgery as long as surgeries are performed well and in moderation. Besides, there's time for everything. There's no excuse for a 20-year old girl who has a facelift done. If, however, one day I decide that I need a plastic surgery, I'll go for it. Plastic surgeons make wonders.

R.: You participated in Miss Venezuela contest. It's not a secret that the event almost forces candidates to do plastic surgery...

N.S.: It's a myth. The participants are offered plastic surgery if it's really necessary and then it's for free. Many girls take advantage of this. They participate in the contest just for a free-of-charge beauty correction. It's not true that they force you to do anything. I was offered a nose surgery. I couldn't get what was wrong with it. It turned out that I've a cleft cartilage here. According to them, a gap in the middle was visible and ugly. I thought they blew it up. It's a trifle after all, nothing unsightly. They didn't force me to do anything though. At that time I was extremely skinny, weighed 10 kilos less than now, so they kept telling me that I needed to get fatter. Although I ate like crazy, I couldn't gain any weight

R.: What do you think makes a soap opera so powerful and magical?

N.S.: A soap opera reflects our fantasies about life. There are characters we want to identify with. For instance, a heroine is a poor girl who becomes a millionaire for whatever reason. Or she's ugly, it's been a fashionable motif recently, and with time she becomes beautiful. Or she may seem quite ordinary, yet, she wins a millionaire's heart. It's something beyond the plot. A heroine must struggle with all possible adversities, and in the end, her life becomes harmonious and she finds her happiness. This is what both men and women dream of. Many people want their life to change, they dream about it and look for it. In Venezuela, people not only are talented but also beautiful. All soap opera characters, even the bad ones, are pretty, nice to look at. Besides, good always wins and is rewarded as a rule, while evil is punished. Watching an opera a viewer forgets about the whole world for a moment and focuses on the story in which they'd like to play the leading role. Although you experience a lot of unpleasant things on the way, finally you find your happiness and achieve what you had been longing for. The message of a soap opera is universal. Everybody all around the world wants peace and beauty. An episode of a series is a moment in which they experience that illusion. I wish it would come true for real! At the moment, a soap opera is going through an evolution: candy love stories move to the background. It's those closer to reality and everyday life that are appealing at the moment. Of course, the frame of an opera doesn't change. There's a man and a woman. They love each other but life prevents them from being together. Yet, they get lucky in the end. They story is enriched by other elements but the basis remains the same. And people like it.

R.: You work in many countries such as Mexico, Peru, Venezuela, Miami. Where is it that working is best or most pleasant?

N.S.: I think that best organization is in Mexico but the studio there is the largest and it has a long-time experience. Televisa seems as big as Hollywood studios. Therefore, both production and post-production must follow certain procedure. Apart from that, it's pretty much the same everywhere. The operas are based on the same pattern and shooting looks the same.

R.: Could your life be compared to a soap opera?

N.S.: I think that everybody has compared their life to a soap opera once. And so have I. I got married, we didn't make it, we split up. I suffered a lot of misery and misfortune at the same time. When I was parting with my husband, my parents got ill. And although everything was going fine in Televisa, I had to return to Venezuela because my family needed me here. Now I'm back to life again and I'm happy with its course. The same happens in soap operas. I hope that in my personal soap opera everything ends well too.

R.: I wish you this with all my heart!

N.S.: Thank you.

R.: Thank you for your time.