As a farewell before the premiere of Senorita 89 and after our interviews with Lucia Puenzo, showrunner, the incredible leading ladies of the show, and Ximena Romo and Juan Manuel Bernal, it’s time to chat with Ilse Salas who tells us about the darkness of Concepción, her background, and her gray morality. Ready?
Here we go!
Concepción is a complex character who puts on a bright smile for the world as she aids and abets horrible deeds by men with power, but in the midst of all this, does she care about the Señoritas she brings to La Encantada? Ilse Salas tells us that “yes, but in her twisted way, never better said. Concepción is not a monster or an insensitive psychopath, she has mixed emotions…and that’s as much as I can tell,” Ilse jokes.
I knew that Concepción had to have another face that she doesn’t show! She cares about her Señoritasbut in a twisted and wrong way…that it ends up hurting everyone, herself included, but why? That’s the question…
In Senorita 89, looks speak louder than words and we seemed to sense that Concepción was especially leaning towards Dolores, but that leads us to consider the dilemma that, if this is so, why doesn’t Concepción offer her help? This is a difficult question for Ilse Salas because it forces her to reveal more than she can at the moment, but she is so cute that she congratulates us for our good eye and sensitivity, she’s flattered by it because we could perhaps feel things that are not at first glance…and you know what they say, folks, a non-answer is an answer (wink, wink.)
We like risk so we dance around the danger some more to try to find out if, at some point, Concepción will turn around and join the Señoritas, helping them. Ilse confesses that “it’s difficult to remain neutral here knowing everything I know…but the beauty of this show is that it’s very choral and many characters are telling their own story, which greatly enriches the series and I find it fantastic, especially because of the talented cast that plays male and female characters. The interesting thing about this is that, as a result of each Señorita telling her story, we will also know the story of Concepción and we will understand many of the actions and decisions that she takes and that we could despise. And maybe, at best, we’ll change our minds about her as the episodes go on.”
Conception’s background that can make us stop despising her? We’re ready!
Delving into this a bit, we think of the moral duality of Concepción. Every person is made up of lights and shadows, but what is Concepción like? Does she have gray morals or does she lean more towards the shadows?
Ilse shares that Concepción “has a very big shadow hanging over her…but anyone who has that dark side is because it surely came from some deep pain or from what they were taught. Certainly, Concepción doesn’t have the most functional family in the world, and many times people are like that because they don’t know any other way to communicate with the world, to inhabit it. This is the case with Concepción. As we speak, she is not an insensitive psychopath, she has a world of contradictions, guilt, and remorse, but also a character that makes her do very questionable things. Playing and defending her, for me, meant moral questioning all the time because as an actress you have to defend your character and justify everything she does and with Concepción sometimes it was not easy at all.”
We’re excited to discover the inside story of Concepción! Maybe, as Ilse says, we still can’t justify her but we can understand her. After all, as Ilse Salas mentions, behind each behavior or way of being there is a reason that nobody sees and that is connected to our past, to our experiences…and we can only imagine the hell that the life of Concepción was to end up in front of La Encantada and everything that happens there.
You can see how hard Ilse worked to get into Concepción’s skin, into her head, to find out how she thinks, how she acts, and why. It’s for this reason that we can’t imagine anyone else in this role, Ilse is perfect because she knows how to blend in with her character in an impressive way, and with her words, you understand how well she knows the character. The question is, will Concepción redeem herself or will she cross the point of no return?
Senorita 89 will premiere with two episodes on February 27 on Pantaya.
