“A wrinkled woman can also be interesting,” he claims. Monica Lopez (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1969), aware that starring in a Spanish series at 55 years old, as she is doing in ‘Rapa’ (which has just released its third and final season on Movistar Plus+), is not too ordinary. A regular in the theatre (especially in Catalonia, as she has lived in Barcelona for more than half her life), we have seen her in television productions such as ‘Nissaga de poder’, ‘Antidisturbios’, ‘La cocinero de Castamar’ and ‘Hierro’. However, she does not have streaming platforms at home.

-This year, ‘Rapa’ not only addresses murders, but also introduces the topic of euthanasia.

-They had to be honest about the subject of Tomás’s illness, the character played by Javier Cámara. He always says something that I really like, which is that this is not an allegory about euthanasia, but rather it is opening the door to the freedom to decide.

-Throughout the three seasons of the series we have seen a very peculiar relationship between her character, Maite, and Tomás. They become friends despite being very different and at first you doubt if there will be something romantic but then you see that there isn’t.

-When we see in the first season that there is this intellectual love affair and the writers end up deciding that there was not going to be a conventional love story, it seems to me to be a total success. At least to me, that is what happens most.

-In what sense?

-I mean, I don’t have many love stories, they end up being more friendships. When I see in movies that they always end up falling in love I love it, but I think this is more realistic. These two characters find that impossible friendship between an egg and a chestnut, because look how different they are… She is super conventional, she follows the protocol of her job, and she finds a guy who makes her think differently. That is sometimes almost better than falling in love, because falling in love ends.

-Your case is quite exceptional. You didn’t usually play leading roles in audiovisual media, and you get one in ‘Rapa’, when you’re over 50 years old.

-I won the lottery, because it is not common. My peers do not work. I am not the paradigm of a beautiful and young woman, so I have to thank the directors of the series for giving me a leading role, and for Movistar accepting it. It seems like a miracle to me, let’s see if they get used to it, because mature women have a lot to say. A wrinkled woman can also be interesting. A bet has been made, not brave, but obvious, and it should be done more often.

-Is it true that you don’t have platforms?

-I don’t have any, and they feed me… But I’m a little scared. It’s like when the private mutual insurance companies came about, I thought they were the downfall of public health, and time has proven me right. The same thing happens to me with the platforms, it’s the privatisation of audiovisuals. It’s fantastic that they’re there, but be careful, the big monsters don’t eat the little ones. Also, I don’t like being a consumer of audiovisuals as if they were sunflower seeds. I know that the great creators are in the series and that I’m missing out on masterpieces, but maybe they’re not as great, or maybe they’re not more great than everything I’ve seen because of my age.

-Isn’t it contradictory? ‘Rapa’ is on a platform.

-It’s contradictory, but what is life? What are we as human beings? It’s my little revolution against the privatization of art.

-Last year there was controversy because he did not go to ‘El Hormiguero’, claiming that no one in the cultural world should visit the programme because it “whitewashes fascism.”

-I later found out that I had never been invited. What a contradiction, isn’t it?

-This year he wasn’t there either, but Javier Cámara was the star of ‘Rapa’ again.

-I’m not going to be invited back after the conflict, so problem solved. I’m not proud of that episode at all. First, because I don’t like vehement people who say things without thinking, and I was exactly that. And the worst thing is that I can speak for myself, but I mentioned third and fourth people, and I completely regret that. I think everyone understood what I think with what I said. But I’m extremely sorry for the way I said it, because I didn’t do it right. When you do something like that, you have to be much smarter than me and have a better sense of humor. And I got angry and spoke without thinking. I was naive, because I didn’t count on social media and that it was going to go viral. Look what a lesson for me, welcome to the modern world.