By Bruno Pischiutta
Actress Helen Laurens’ strive to excellence while facing depression and lack of self-confidence proved successful in achieving the balance and calm necessary to great artistic performances.
Helen Laurens’ casting application for The Trilogy, besides her CV and an introductory letter, contained only six tiny close-up photos from her Spotlight account. They were very few and small photos, compared to what the actors normally send!
I read the CV and her accompanying letter. I learnt that Helen Laurens is an actress of Latvian origin living and working in England. Helen grew up in the city of Riga and, after moving to the UK with her mother at a young age, she pursued acting as a career. Helen started on stage, taking lead roles in Road, DNA, A Streetcar Named Desire and several Shakespeare plays, but her passion was always to act in film. She achieved that, and in 2023 alone she managed to star in 15 movies. In her career to date, she acted in over 30 productions.
I remember looking at those tiny photos carefully and, in particular, I was impressed by what I could read in young Helen’s eyes: an extreme sensitivity and a victorious search for a very sophisticated inner balance.
When I spoke to her on the phone for the first time, I found her immensely calm; I asked her why she had chosen to be in film and what her main motivation for becoming an actress was. She answered that she was not motivated by the idea of achieving success, fame and money but that her main interest was to be part of artistic entities because she believed in the cathartic function of art.
I then asked if I had rightly sensed an inner struggle in her eyes, and Helen candidly replied: “When I was younger, I felt like I didn’t fit in and I was sad about that, but it turned out to be my biggest advantage! And I still remember my first day on set, it’s as if that dark cloud had instantly disappeared from my life and everything was suddenly fine. I wish everyone to find something they love so much that consumes them, no matter how difficult or overwhelming it may seem at first. The things you hold in your heart and are so passionate about, I believe they are there for a reason, and everyone should trust that feeling and go with it.”
At the end of our first phone call, I asked her what her future goals were. All she told me was that she wants to tell stories: “I have to be myself for the rest of my life; there is nothing more exciting than being someone else. One of the most beautiful things about cinema is that it lives forever; people don’t, but characters do.” She added then “although I have struggled with self-confidence and depression for years, my drive and passion for art have been stronger than any negative emotion I have ever felt. I have no regrets, and I am grateful for every experience in life, because I believe it has only benefited my performance.”
All this happened a few months ago. Afterwards, I had the chance to talk to Helen several times, to give her an audition via Skype for the part of Elise, an important role in the third film of The Trilogy, and to get to know more about her. So we became friends, Helen got the part of Elise and also became a member of Global Film Actors Agency. Here is Helen’s profile.
I see the great talent of this young and beautiful actress, and I am certain that her international career will skyrocket without limits.
I like to conclude this article with another quote from Helen, which gives us even more insight about her and reveals her selflessness: “I believe it’s important to talk about overcoming the darkness because I think a lot of people can identify with it, but don’t always address it. I hope that being open about my own struggles, it can motivate someone who is having a bad day or who is just feeling down in the dumps to know that it is possible to get out of that hole, that the heaviness will eventually fade away, and that in order to overcome the struggle, everyone just has to be strong for that moment.”
The Trilogy, the highly anticipated project that is touching on sensitive and very actual subjects of our time such a freedom of speech, the sexualization of children, Satanism, and pedophilia, is the latest creation of Maestro Bruno Pischiutta, who wrote the original screenplays. The Trilogy consists of three feature films and three documentaries that will be produced by Bruno Pischiutta and Daria Trifu. The motion pictures will be directed by Pischiutta while the documentaries will be directed by Trifu.
Bruno Pischiutta, member of the European Film Academy, is an internationally celebrated and awarded writer, director and producer whose career spans more than five decades. He is especially noted for his socially and existentially oriented films.
Pischiutta is one of the last great Italian filmmakers of his generation. During his career, he created and developed numerous feature films in Europe, America, Africa and Asia, and won important awards in several countries. In China he wrote and developed the feature film The Sepia Portrait, and in Ghana he completed the feature Punctured Hope, which the Hollywood Political Film Society recognized as the Best Film Exposé and Best Film on Human Rights of that year, and proposed it for nomination at the Academy Awards®.
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