Best known for her role as Petra Potgieter in the local telenovela Legacy which kept South Africans enthralled for two years, actress Trix Vivier says acting is a very painful job, emotionally.
While she has been in the industry for 13 years, she is only now feeling like she is scratching the surface in terms of career success, Trix said, speaking to The Citizen.
When asked what she would have want to become if she could choose another career path, the actress, who is also a classically trained ballerina, laughingly joked that if she could have done anything else, she probably would have, as there is a lot of literal pain to get to a space where you feel you have the freedom to act.
“When you embark on a journey to become a freelance actor, you can’t want anything else. The only way to succeed at becoming an actor is to have an unyielding belief in yourself.”
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Separating your character from ‘real life’
While she has portrayed many different roles over the years, Trix says the one character that ‘followed her from on-screen to real life’ was Petra Potgieter from Legacy.
While living in Parkhurst, she was walking to a nearby restaurant one day when a group of teenage boys drove past her and shouted ‘Yo, Potgieter’. The actress who is currently in Dubai says even there she is being recognised as Petra Potgieter.
“You never realise how far-reaching a show is until you go out into the world.”
Trix says there is a familiarity between audiences and characters from telenovelas. “The audience don’t separate you from your character in a telenovela. It’s very different from a drama series like Fraksie or Trackers.”
Most difficult character you had to portray
Having been in the industry for 13 years and having starred in numerous productions including Minder as Niks, Fraksie, Projek Dina, 7de Laan, Suidooster, Sterlopers and Trackers, Trix says portraying the role of Petra Potgieter in Legacy was the most challenging for her.
“There were facets of Petra that were really demanding. The topics her character had to speak about touched on class, race, alcoholism, pregnancy and abortion. As these are all very explosive topics in South Africa, I felt there was a big responsibility to do it right, with gravitas and heart,” the actress said.
From Trix Vivier to Petra Potgieter
Trix says she loves prepping for a new character, likening the preparation process to building a library.
When preparing for a new role she always starts with the script and reads it a couple of times to familiarise herself with the setting, the characters and the emotions amongst other things.
She then starts building a character profile from evidence she found in the script and creates a ‘scrapbook of images’ in her head about the character’s life.
Some of her roles require extra training as well like learning to swim, shoot and disarm someone pointing a gun at her, which the actress says she loves doing.
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Commuting between three countries
Trix has been living abroad since October 2022. The actress who didn’t want to divulge too much as yet, said they moved to Dubai for her husband’s work and that she is in the process of venturing into the film industry abroad.
Trix says she will be living and traveling between Cape Town, Amsterdam and Dubai and that she will be working on two very exciting shows early next year.
