Irene Arcos: “It’s liberating to play women who do wrong things”

Everyone lies, but one can’t help but think that his character, Macarena, is the most guilty. Is it because of that image that has haunted him since the first season?

In this second season, the script has played on this: to disable Macarena more, to entangle him more in his lies, and that may be one of the reasons why you believe him less. Even though the driving force of my character this time is trying to be a good mother, as in the first one, this situation dynamites everything. She now wants to do it well, but she does it impulsively and clumsily, implicating herself in lies. And sometimes it’s not good to lie to protect, because everything takes its toll in the end. A lie is like a spider web. And my character is in a spider web that he has woven and is trapped in.

That’s everyone’s duty: to protect their children no matter what.

Macarena carries a deep sense of guilt, and this is where she finds justification for remaining impunity to her friends abroad… She feels guilty towards her motherhood and her daughter. Everything he does is to protect her, yes, but there is also a huge amount of denial. Because if the character had taken on his daughter’s situation, he wouldn’t have done that. But here’s the thing: It will be a temporary thing, I will take care of it….

But she doesn’t seem to want to take care of the baby inside her. He does not stop smoking and drinking alcohol.

He uses this pregnancy as a bargaining chip to keep Ana (the unborn child’s grandmother) from saying anything, to silence her and protect her daughter.

Ana (Natalia Verbeke) will do whatever it takes to protect her grandson.

Ana has completely lost her mind. He mourns the death of his son and clings to the only ray of light that can give him emotion. Ana takes advantage of this: she is the child. He clings to this to keep something of his son alive and follows what Macarena tells him. And she is trying to see if she has another chance, to prevent her daughter from going to jail, to avoid destroying her. And be a good mother. I think my character carries a huge sense of guilt, but he’s also trying to hide a false normality, his apparent business management… But he backs himself into a corner and the chip falls out. That’s when we see the mother’s pain.

In a way, they also lie to themselves to get ahead. Sometimes arrogant.

I believe that sometimes this can happen to us in the face of a very big situation. Your brain looks for ways to escape. Knowing everything he knows, he can have coffee with his friends and want the old normalcy of life even though he has everything in it. But these are momentary lies because you can lie to yourself but sooner or later reality always prevails. There comes a time when this no longer works.

All these complicated events and scenario changes test their acting skills.

Pau (Freixas) always guided us. It tells us the emotional connection of the character. Now we come out of a perhaps more tense situation with the discovery of something, and in the next sequence, “I want her to be the imitation queen here.” Sometimes I’m surprised at how he acts. But with these contradictory characters, he weaved his entire map of emotions to keep us in what he was looking for: Macarena can cry and be overwhelmed in one scene, and after a while, she puts on a dress and goes to see her police friend and takes action. as if it were nothing. There is a frivolity and some games that Pablo clearly understands from the script. They threw us off, but that’s why the show works.

She says she loves this show because it represents a flawed woman.

It is truly liberating to be able to create women who are wrong, who make mistakes, who make mistakes, who are not governed by standards of beauty, goodness, sexiness, or canons that until now were only allowed in different profiles. We can do this as actresses, instead entering places that have been hitherto embodied by male figures in fiction. Flawed characters who can be funny, make mistakes, dress badly… and that’s how they look great and are loved for their flaws. Well, how nice it is to be able to do this to women too…

He won’t complain about the roles he’s played so far. He even participated in an iconic series such as ‘Cuéntame’.

It was a small participation, but like all actors and actresses in this country, it is a series that has been around for so many years that I think you will get over it sooner or later. I think she was Toni’s secretary. These are the little things we do. We are talking about a profession in which only 8 percent work and earn a living. This means that there is no longer a single generation that has not had this opportunity. In fact, it is a sum of things and everything that is done is a step that leads us to who we are.

Do you want a third season of ‘Everyone Lies’?

Third and anyway with Pau. Whatever you want, I’m on your team.

Lately, there have been rumors about your private life, but you always keep it aside. How do you get this?

I’m just talking about my job.