Interview: Dragana Dabović, actress

To really listen is a form of Love

TV show "In therapy", based on the Israel show "Be Tipul" by the author Hagai Levi, is being shown since October 19th to Serbian audience on FOX television. Brilliant team of actors, led by Miki Manojlović playing the part of therapist Ljubomir, shows us some very intimate moments of the patients who reveal more and more throughout the series. Dragana Dabović, an actress who fit in perfecly playing the demanding role of Ana, sports girl in the age of seventeen, speaks for the WAVE magazine about her first acting engagement. Her character comes to therapy after an attempt of suicide


By JOVANA GRUBAČ (jovana.grubac@wavemagazine.net)
from Belgrade, SERBIA
Translation: SUNČICA JOVANOVIĆ


"To really listen is a form of love" - said Gabriel Byrne in an interview. In these times when things happen much faster, from new information arriving to maybe even the passing of time, in spite of education, culture, knowledge that bomb us every day from our TV screens, man listens to himself less and less, not to mention other people in his surrounding. Still, even though we have a need to share our problems with someone who is not subjective, there are still prejudices about going to a therapist.

TV show "In therapy", based on the Israel show "Be Tipul" by the author Hagai Levi, is being shown since October 19th to Serbian audience on FOX television. Brilliant team of actors, led by Miki Manojlović playing the part of therapist Ljubomir, shows us some very intimate moments of the patients who reveal more and more throughout the series. Dragana Dabović, an actress who fit in perfecly playing the demanding role of Ana, sports girl in the age of seventeen, speaks about her first acting engagement for the WAVE magazine. Her character comes to therapy after an attempt of suicide.

As mentioned, Ana is played by a new face of our acting circles-Dragana Dabović, student of the third year in the Academy of natural arts in Novi Sad, class of professor Jasna Đuričić and Sanja Ristić Krajnov. Until she turned eighteen, Dragana lived in Herceg Novi (Montenegro), where she started to act in the local theatre. As she herself says: "Since then, I do not know what life is without theatre equipment, masks, stage and costumes."

The show "In therapy" brings something brand new for Serbian actors and audience as well. Was it hard to break the ice, considering the fact that this is your first role, and you already play the part of a character who demands 25 minutes minimum of focusing only on emotions and the dialogue between you and the therapist?

- Getting the role, casting itself and test shootings happened so fast that I myself never had the time to think about "breaking the ice" and about the difficulty of the expecting task. The excitement about my first professional engagement lasted short as well, because I had to concentrate on resolving the character and the given tasks. The only thing I was aware of was that I have been awarded with en enormous privilege and honour.

After the first, original version-the Israel one, this show also had an American version. How did you resolve the problem of giving some personal colours to the character and still keep the original features common for every climate?

- I received from the director an example of the HBO version and after watching it for only a few minutes, I decided it would be for the best if I did my own version of Ana and by doing that, offer the audience a part of me, escaping from any similarity with the Israel and American version. I would do that again.

The screenplay for the original version was written by a working psychiatrist. Therefor, the characters are quite realistic and complexed. What whas the biggest challenge when it comes to yours?

- For me personally, the biggest challenge was hiding any kind of emotion and escaping from her cruel, ruined childhood. Also, the very fight within the character, to confess or not, to protect the ones who have ruined her life or face with your own problems and become one with them.

Almost all 25 minutes, which is the duration of one episode, the therapist and the patients are seated and that limits body lanugage. How much attention did that require in order to show Ana's emotional state?

- I would say that it was the only way of concentrating on her emotional condition, because it seemed that every gesture and movement could distract, considering the fact that the story is not naive at all. It would be lying to say it was easy. It is hard to maintain the audience's full attention for 25 to 35 minutes, but in the moment of shooting, you think the least about if it is interesting or not, because the story is about a distressed child eager for attention and love.

Has this part, your first professional work, brought together some new offers?

- Yes, this is my first professional work and I am exceedingly happy that the path is slowly revealing to me, because as we speek, I am working on a new movie... But we will leave the topic for another time.

Maybe it is still too early to ask if you would prefer to be a movie, television or theatre actress, since your career is just starting?

- Yes, it is still early for that kind of decision, but I am sure about one thing-my priority has always been the world of theatre, although I do not run away from cameras which are a whole different way of acting, and to me as an actrees, this only gives a wide selection of challenges and opportunities.


(Published: 11.11.2009.)