Young Estonian Drama Theatre actor Emili Rohumaa poses for photographer Virge Viertek, styled by Kärt Hammer, and admits that she would totally fight Daleks.
Ever since I was a child I felt the urge to act out scenarios I read from books or saw on the telly, copying people around me and transforming into everything & everywhere. The wish to study drama felt natural.
Until now every new material or role has brought up a challenge I could never have predicted. Sometimes, the challenge is how to build a strong base for a character and how to keep it truthful and fresh from night to night; sometimes, the material itself is already a challenge. The biggest challenges for me lately have been how to change the patterns that emerge in stressful and unknown situations that I don’t like about myself. In this kind of work, you face your personal stuff on a daily basis, which is both the beauty and the hell of it.
I graduated last year and have been working in Estonian Dramatheatre since then. I am lucky to get to play a lot in different genres and work with colleagues who have years of experience on stage. This spring is expected to be busy with three premieres coming up, two of them outside of my home theatre. I feel like now is the time to do as much as I can, as if school has actually now really begun.
Another thing I am really happy about is that I get to work on my music. Singing and songwriting has been an ongoing private project for years.
Of course, it would be great to work abroad, but I’m in no rush — I feel like there are people, places, and things yet to be discovered at home.
The one thing that interests me the most is the chemistry between the performers both on stage and on set. If there’s a willingness to be vulnerable, daring, and honest, then that’s the foundation upon which other layers can be built. I think that is one of the reasons I wanted to pursue acting because theatre explores the concentrate of human contact. I felt the contact, that indescribable something, while watching Mikey Madison and Yuri Borisov in “Anora”, while watching Östlund’s characters desperately communicating with one another. I have felt it on stage, once or twice.
Which famous Estonian actor would you like to have on your team in case of a zombie apocalypse, and why?
I would ask my sister Mia because she knows how to survive. And luckily, she is not an actor.
What’s one memorable moment or lesson you’ve learned on set/stage?
You can only work with the body of today and the audience of today – you cannot repeat the successes of yesterday, and there’s no point in thinking ahead.
Could you picture yourself as an action hero? What type?
Someone who sings lugulaul about everything that happens around her.
Would you prefer to fight Alien or Predator?
I would prefer battling Daleks.
If you could work with any director or actor in the world, who would it be and why?
Cate Blanchett knows the art of transformation and that is something I would love to learn from her.
If you could spend a day with any famous artist, living or dead, whom would you choose?
Joni Mitchell – spending an afternoon reading through her notebooks and scores, seeing her way of thinking up close.
What is your favorite Estonian film?
Just lately, I watched “Sügisball” by Veiko Õunpuu and a few days later, Trier’s “Dancer in the Dark” — an odd and unexpected dialogue started between these two films, leaving me totally mesmerized, both melancholic and hopeful.
Cat, dog, or dragon?
My family’s sloughi Hara, who acts more like a dragon-princess than a dog.
