Wagner Moura Refuses to Be Typecast

Wagner Moura has long been one of Brazil’s most magnetic performers, with a slew of Brazilian Academy Awards to prove it. In the U.S., he’s best known for his unflinching portrayal of Pablo Escobar in Narcos and for acclaimed turns in Elite Squad, Sergio, and Civil War. This year, the 49-year-old actor, producer, and director achieved a new level of international recognition with The Secret Agent, Kleber Mendonça Filho’s political thriller set amid the chaos of Brazil’s military dictatorship in the 1970s. The film earned Mendonça Filho best director at the Cannes Film Festival, while Moura’s gripping performance as Marcelo, a tech worker trying to reconnect with his son during Carnival, led him to be named best actor, making him the first Brazilian star ever to receive the honor. Now he’s up for his first Golden Globe in a film category, having earned a previous nomination for Narcos.

Your film is set during a difficult time in Brazil.

Yes. I love movies, and I love politics. Politics is what put Kleber and I together. We met 20 years ago in Cannes. I was obsessed with working with him, but it never worked out. Then, in Brazil from 2018 to 2022, it was a bad moment in terms of the government. Kleber and I were very vocal against what was going on, and we both suffered the consequences. We talked about how we could show the perplexity that we were experiencing. It took us two, three years to make the film happen.

Despite the political turmoil, the film shows how normal life carries on.

From 1964 to 1985, there was a dictatorship in Brazil. The guy I play is not trying to overthrow the government—he’s just trying to stick with his values in a world where everything around him says just the opposite. I remember when I did Narcos, I was always asking my friends who were in Colombia about when Pablo Escobar was putting bombs everywhere. They were like, “Wagner, we were living our lives. We were going to bars.”

Let’s talk about the costumes—particularly your sandals and the short shirts.

That’s very regional. Our film takes place in Recife, rather than in São Paulo or Rio. That’s in the northeast of Brazil, which is near Salvador, where I’m from. It’s a part of the country rarely portrayed in films. Those sandals are part of that. And the way men unbuttoned their shirts, showing their chests—I remember my father used to wear a shirt like that and place his pack of cigarettes in his left pocket, just the way my character does.

There’s a running Jaws motif in the film. What is the significance of that?

Kleber used to be a critic. He loves American films from the ’70s, and you can see by the way he shoots his movies. The other thing is, sharks are a horrible reality in Recife. Not horrible—they’re sharks. We keep blaming them for doing what they do, but they've been killing lots of people. You cannot get on the beach in Recife. It's forbidden, and the beaches are beautiful.

What was your Cannes Film Festival experience like last year?

Cannes was great, but a little bittersweet. I was shooting this film in London and had to go back there. On Saturday, it was the ceremony, and a friend of mine called while I was in the middle of shooting. I was like, "Oh my God, Kleber won." He was like, "No, you won!" Then I went to shoot this scene where I put a plastic bag on my hand and pick up dog shit. I was doing that and thinking to myself, I just won best actor in Cannes.

Which language do you dream in?

I dream in Portuguese. I didn’t speak English until my films started to travel and I had to talk about them. Javier Bardem said something—that when he works in English, it’s as if there's a big office in his head with people working for that thing to function. And then he says, "When I work in Spanish, the office is empty." I love that metaphor. I have to check with Javier if he really said that.

What was your first job?

I was 15 when I started doing lots of theater. Where I'm from, there was a lot of prejudice against actors, the way we spoke, our accents. Brazil’s star system is built around television—telenovelas, soap operas. The characters people from my town would play were stereotyped—the funny guy, the poor, or bandits. An actor could only dream of working onstage.

Did you expect Narcos to become so massive?

Back then, everybody was like, "This is going to work in some places, but not in the U.S., because Americans don't read subtitles." That’s not true, thank God.

Did you worry about being typecast afterward?

Given my background, from a place where there was prejudice against actors and the way they spoke, I was like, I’m not going to let this happen to me. The number of things that I passed on after Narcos—drug dealers, tough guys, and Latino dudes. I said, “No, I'm not going to do that.” I want to go for the same kind of characters that all the white American dudes are going for. I want to play a character called Michael who speaks the way I speak, because I represent a big portion of this country—people who came here, speak with accents, and are important for what we know as the United States.

What’s your favorite reality show?

I'm not a reality show guy. I don’t watch much TV. I've never seen Mad Men, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos. What’s the name of that show with dragons that everybody loves? Game of Thrones? I’ve never seen it. I know they’re all great, but I would have to start from the beginning, and there are so many seasons. I have three sons. I don’t know how people find time to do that.

Style Director: Allia Alliata di Montereale. Codirector: Frank Lebon. Director of photography: André Chemetoff. Hair by Jawara for L’Oréal Professional at Art Partner; makeup by Lauren Parsons for Sisley Paris at Art Partner; manicure by Jolene Brodeur for Dazzle Dry at the Wall Group. Set design by David White at Streeters.