Karla Sofia Gascón insisted to the end. In Emilia Perez, she would play both the eponymous character and Manitas, her double. Yet, Jacques Audiard, the film’s director, didn’t see it that way. For months, the filmmaker remained convinced that he would cast two different performers. This was without counting on the unfailing determination of her actress, who won her case after dozens of phone calls. Thus, in the feature film presented in Official Competition of the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, she has two faces, two bodies, which she embodies with grace and power, in a composition that moves. Emilia Pérez is, by far, one of the most captivating protagonists of this 77th edition. So much so that, at the age of 52, she won the prize for best female performance, alongside all the actresses in the film. Today, she shows for Vogue World: Paris in Saint Laurentalongside the French actress Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu. A look back at the actress’ journey.
© Shanna Besson / PAGE 114 / WHY NOT PRODUCTIONS / PATHÉ FILMS / FRANCE 2 CINÉMA / SAINT LAURENT PRODUCTIONS
A life of TV soaps
If his name was until now completely unknown to us, Karla Sofia Gascón is adored by the Spanish public for many years. Born in Madrid, she pursued cinema studies with the already certain goal of becoming an actress. Thus, the young woman began her career at the end of the 1980s, between shy appearances on television, sometimes in B series, sometimes in advertisements. Year after year, the roles offered are more important, in popular series like The Super or The Past is Tomorrow. These latter allow Karla Sofia Gascón to become a famous name in the world of TV soaps, these television series produced mainly in Latin American countries. In the cinema, we meet her in 2013 in the Mexican film We the noblea success at the local box office.
In 2018, the career of Karla Sofia Gascón takes a turn. At 46, she made her coming-out trans, and decides to publish his story in the book Karsia, an extraordinary story (in French: “Karsia, an extraordinary story”). Asked about her transgender identity at the press conferenceEmilia Perez in Cannes, the actress declared: “On the networks, you type the word ‘trans’, it’s the porn or the insults that appear first. I received death threats just for existing”.
