Chapter 1: What divine experiences does Wagner Moura describe?
Have you ever experienced some divine power?
There's some moments on the stage that there is a connection. Something happens. It's like there's something going on that's not from these.
Between you, the audience, the third thing that becomes your connection.
And the third thing. Yes, the third thing. Exactly. That it's divine.
I'm Rachel Martin, and this is Wildcard, the show where cards control the conversation. Each week, my guest answers questions about their life, questions pulled from a deck of cards. They're allowed to skip one question and to flip one back on me. My guest this week is Wagner Mora.
There were moments where I was like, oh, I really need that money, man. Right. You know, but I'm like, I can't do this. I can't do that because otherwise I'll be miserable.
After watching the Brazilian film The Secret Agent, I came away with a deeper appreciation for how much fear, resolve, and longing can be communicated through a person's eyes. Wagner Moura subtly conveys all those emotions as a man on the run in a military dictatorship.
Yes, there are powerful moments of dialogue, but so much of Wagner's talent as a storyteller and an actor comes in what is left unsaid.
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Chapter 2: How does Wagner Moura define the sacredness of performing?
How he uses the negative space to make us feel and to make us think. I am so very happy to welcome Wagner Mora to Wildcard. Hi.
That was a thoughtful introduction. Thank you.
Well, I'm very pleased to have you here. And many congratulations are in order because the film itself... has been nominated for several Academy Awards, and you yourself have been nominated, the first Brazilian male actor to be nominated in the Best Acting category for this film. Congrats!
Thank you. Thank you so much. We're very happy.
Well, we'll talk more about the movie in a few minutes, but we're just going to go. You ready to play this game?
Let's go.
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Chapter 3: What challenges did Wagner face in his acting career?
Yes, I am. I'm excited about it. Let's do it.
Let's try it out. First three cards, Wagner, you pick one, two, or three.
Three.
Three. That's this one. What did your parents teach you to love?
Elderly people.
Elderly people.
Yeah. My parents were very serious in, like, that we should always respect people that were older than we were. And that ended up translating to me, for what I do, the admiration and respect that I have for actors, especially in Brazil, that opened space for younger actors in terms of work opportunities. And it was hard to be an actor back in the beginning of the 20th century.
So every time I meet up an actor that looks like in their 85, 90s right now, I know there is a reverence that I have towards these people that it's, yeah, that's very important to me.
Who was the elder person who they made sure you had connection with? Like, can you think of a person who?
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Chapter 4: How does Wagner Moura prioritize joy in his work?
But at some point, I think I wish I had more time to, you know, to have joy.
And did you feel joy?
Did you feel joy in my daily life? And I think that at some point, and to have joy, especially in this thing that I do, it's so important because sometimes we forget about the joy of it all, the joy of doing what we do, and it became like a pragmatic thing. I was watching a couple of years ago the documentary about the Beatles, You know, the one that Peter Jackson directed.
And they were like, oh, they were fighting and it was like horrible. Everything was not going well. And one of them was about to leave the band. I think it was George.
Chapter 5: What influences shaped Wagner's respect for older actors?
But when they played, when they played together, they had so much fun and joy. And they were messing around with the music and they were playing like, And they were looking at each other, and they were laughing, and they were having fun. I've been telling myself, like, just, yeah, have fun. Enjoy. Enjoy each moment of your life. Like, it's here. I'm here with you, and let's enjoy this moment.
It's hard, though. I imagine in your creative work, too, you get momentum, right? Like, and people talk about, oh, you've caught fire now. And so now more projects are going to come and more directors come to you and the scripts get better and better and your choices get better. And if you don't keep moving, right?
Like a shark in the water, like you got to keep moving and taking the opportunities or else, oh no, Wagner, they're going to go away. You're going to, you know, you got to act now. Do you feel those kinds of pressures? Is it hard to say no?
I felt that before. It's interesting because I have felt that before with other things because I've been doing this since I was 15. For example, when I did Narcos, it was a thing and everybody was like, you should do, and I was like, but I always, I have to say, always rejected that I always kind of did the opposite of what was expected. Now, for example, I'm going to go to Brazil.
I'm going to do a very independent film there. After that, I'm going to tour with my play in Europe. I'm going to be doing theater. And then in the end of the year, I'm going to direct my film, also a very small independent film. That doesn't mean that I'm not aware of like the new possibilities are coming because of the moment. But they're not going to go away.
And you're going to center joy in all these projects, right?
And you're not going to work too hard. And I'm going to privilege joy. Yeah. And to do what I want to do, what I feel, not what I expected for one to do, but what you want to do. Yeah. Yeah.
Last one in this memories round. One, two, or three.
One.
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Chapter 6: How does Wagner Moura view the intersection of art and politics?
Yeah. And I also felt that, oh, there was so much ahead of me. Yeah. You know, like I'm going to, you know, I'm still like, I don't know, I think I was, I don't know, 13, 14. I don't know. I don't remember. There's so much ahead of me. Yeah. You know, I'm going to live for so long. Yeah. It's also true that it passes real fast.
It passes real fast.
That feels like not as long time ago. Sometimes I still feel that I still have 13 years old.
Hey, everybody. Ever since we launched Wildcard, there is one thing that you have asked about more than anything else. Where can I get the Wildcard deck? We hear it constantly. You've been very patient, and I'm so excited to finally announce that it is here, the Wildcard deck. It's available at the NPR shop. You can find it at shopnpr.org.
And we've selected some of our very favorite questions from the show. And we made this custom deck for you, our audience. It is just a phenomenal way to think about your own memories, insights, and beliefs over dinner, with the family, maybe on a road trip with friends. It's a way to connect and learn new things about people you are just meeting or people you have known all of your life.
Check it out at shopnpr.org. We are so excited for you to try it out. Again, shopnpr.org. Yeah. Yeah.
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Chapter 7: What insights does Wagner share about aging and self-acceptance?
Yeah.
Yeah, the Genesis, I mean, I met him a long time ago. I met him in Cannes when he used to be a critic back then. But we hit it off in a festival because we are also from the same region. He's from Salvador, both cities from the northeast of Brazil.
I'm going to misstate his name, so I was hoping you would just do it, but I'll try. Kleber Mendonca Filho?
Mendoza.
Mendoza. Can you just say it for me?
Yeah. Clabber Mendoza Filho. Yeah. But you did a pretty good job. And I met him and I was like, dude, I want to work with you. And then he invited me to be in his film Bacurau that he directed in 2018. But I couldn't be in it because I was directing my own film. And so we created this – and we were both always very – so we –
Kleber and I, we are very different people, but we see Brazil and we see the role of an artist in a very similar way. We think that art and politics, they are not separated. But this film is openly a political film because it comes from our shared perplexity over what was going on in Brazil from 2010. 18 to 2022 when Brazil elected democratically a fascist president.
And we were both very, Bolsonaro, and we were both very vocal against him. And we both suffered the consequences of that. So I think that the secret agent came from that, from like, how can we, we wanted to work together, we wanted to do something together. And so it's like the film about this man that is sticking with the values that he has when everything around him is saying the opposite.
It felt something that related a lot, resonated a lot with Clubber and I.
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Chapter 8: How does Wagner Moura reflect on life, death, and meaning?
Was it an easy decision for you or was there a moment of pause like maybe this isn't how I'm going to make the most impact?
No, it was a very organic decision for me because I was making a film about... The film is called Marighella and it's about the leader of the armed resistance in Brazil against the dictatorship. And that film that I directed was censored by Bolsonaro and all that. And I couldn't... I mean, I...
How could I be doing a film about a freedom fighter and not to fight for that film to be released and to have a proper release in the country? So I engaged in that fight with lots of energy. It was hard because this polarization is just really hard. It's really hard. It's really difficult because people are living in different mental states. That's what's separating us.
It's like we are not living in the same world. We are not seeing reality in the same way. Right. The hardest thing for me when I engaged in that fight against the government in Brazil to have my film released, and against the government itself and against everything that that government represented,
It was hard, but the hardest thing was because I felt that we were not talking the same language, that we were not talking about the same reality.
Which is, it comes through in the way that you play this character, Armando, because you see him... Struggling to make sense of something that's not sensible. The facts on the ground don't matter anymore. As a viewer, you sort of see for him how words fail, ultimately. Like, it's not going to make a difference. And then he's just trying to survive.
Yeah. I think this is also a film about infamy. You know, because it's... how he was treated and how, and we shouldn't give any spoilers here, but the way he's treated in the end of the film and the way it's displayed, who he was, in the newspaper, it's so unfair and that happens so often.
Like right now when the government and people are trying to discredit the man, I forgot his name, that got killed, the nurse, Alex Preddy. Yeah. So they start all this campaign against him, like saying people are inventing lies about his life. And it's so cruel because you kill him twice. You killed him, and then you try to kill his reputation. You try to kill his memory.
That is a grim parallel that I hadn't thought of with your film.
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