Interview: Tuukka Leppänen
I came into the industry through musicals. I was in music classes in Lahti from primary school onwards, playing the cello and singing a lot. After high school, I studied at the Lahti University of Applied Sciences in the musical theatre programme of the Department of Music for a couple of years before applying to the Theatre Academy in 2003 and getting in.
The following year, I was involved in Saturday Night Fever, directed by Marco Bjuström, through which I first got an invitation to the camp and later, through a few twists and turns, I got a job here. The teachers at Teak let me go on the condition that I was not allowed to do musicals only. For the first couple of years, I worked as a freelancer, in 2008 I got a job, and in 2015 I was made permanent.
As an actor, I’m cautious at first. I need a clear framework within which to act so that the inner world of the role comes to life. When you start practicing, you can’t feel, walk or talk at first. Little by little, you start to grow and suddenly you are in a situation where you can fill and control the whole space. Then being relaxes so that it no longer feels forced.
Premieres are always difficult. When the first audience comes, horror strikes every time and you become fully aware of your own acting. Then you act in such a way that you are always a little outside of yourself or next to you. The older and more experienced you become, the less time it takes for being to become light but active again, living in the moment and in a situation.
The work of an actor requires that you dare to ignore how you look or feel, and that you dare to think and do things that do not come automatically. You have to be curious and childlike enthusiasm. The work also requires tolerating badness, incompleteness and other people.
I think it’s a universal ideal to try to be the kind of co-worker who makes it easier for others to work and brings lightness to life and being. It’s wonderful to be able to be a person who shows daily that this isn’t so serious after all. There are such people here, and I would like to strive for one myself.
This is a very unique and dear spiritual atmosphere, and it is formed by the people who work here. With them, new things are born, emotions are explored and lived through. Although emotions are made or determined, they are emotions that are usually reserved only for the people closest to them. Here you do it for a living, and it’s pretty wild. As a side effect, this involves a certain requirement for trust and openness.
The work of an actor is endlessly interesting, because every production includes something that you were not aware of before. With the help of theatre, history becomes so much more alive, and cause and effect relationships begin to be better understood. Our task as actors and artists is to help the audience empathize with the fates of different people, to be able to show taboos and to cultivate empathy.
At the Helsinki City Theatre, you can do a lot of things if you are persistent, and here you can work in a way that you know for sure that you have done. Although at first I was more of a musical-maker, nowadays I get to do other drama as well. Each year feels more interesting than the other. This is a safe place to look for ways to tell stories.