by Helen Barlow
French-Romanian actress Anamaria Vartolomei [left at Cannes, photo by Helen Barlow], 26, has gone from strength to strength since she starred in Audrey Diwan’s Happening which won the Golden Lion in Venice in 2021, and for which she went on to receive numerous awards herself.
Stunningly beautiful and now an ambassador for Chanel, Vartolomei manages to conjure a resolve in her characters that has made her casting hugely appealing.
Who else could play a younger version of Glenn Close’s Marquise de Merteuil in the French-language prequel, The Seduction? The HBO Max six-part series reunites Vartolomei with Jessica Palud, her director on Being Maria, where she played Maria Schneider during her turbulent life, including her rise to fame after shooting Last Tango in Paris.
Meanwhile, in Vartolomei’s latest French-language film, the Belgian hospital drama, Adam’s Sake, she plays a single mother fighting with the help of a formidable nurse (Lea Drucker) to retain the custody of her malnourished four-year-old son, who she insists on feeding unusual concoctions.
As for blockbusters, Vartolomei made her English-language debut with a small role in Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 and was a standout in The Count of Monte Cristo, as Ottoman princess Haydee, an orphaned slave whom Dantes buys as part of his master plan to get back at the man responsible for her father’s death, and who becomes a willing accomplice in Dantes’ elaborate retribution scheme.
After the success of Happening, you’ve said you had many offers, but all the roles were pretty much the same.
“Yes, I feel that people have a lack of imagination. If you do a drama, they will ask you only for dramas. And if you do a comedy, they will ask you to go only in this direction. In a strange way, I received many scripts linked to abortion after Happening, and I was asking myself, why do people want to see me in something like I just did? So, I waited and Bruno Dumont came along with The Empire. That was something I never really imagined doing, because he wasn’t a director I was familiar with and I wanted to do that, mostly because it was something out of my comfort zone.”
What is it about Laura Wandel’s Adam’s Sake that made you decide to accept the role?
“What drew me to Adam’s Sake was that I felt that Laura’s script was very visceral, very radical. She has a very precise way of creating and building a story. I’d seen Playground, her first feature film, and I was amazed by the fact that she always puts herself on a child’s level. Now she’s reversing it, and she presents the story of a child from the adults’ point of view. I feel that she has this very soft and delicate way of being, but behind that, she’s a fighter, and she knows what she wants from her story and from her movie. She doesn’t always know how to go there, so we created this together with Lea [co-star Drucker]. The three of us were very dependent on each other.”
I couldn’t believe your scream when your Rebecca character tries to escape the hospital with her son. How did you conjure such passion?
“My major reference was Ladybird Ladybird by Ken Loach, though the mother there is more hysterical and more excessive than in our movie. At some point, we wanted to give Rebecca a situation where her fragility and her dysfunction could appear more.”
You don’t have children, but could you imagine her position, having her son taken away?
“I think it’s hard. I asked myself what it is to be a good mother. Does it exist to be a bad mother? I don’t feel that she wants to hurt her child. I think she’s sure that what she’s doing is good for him, and I think you just have to heal yourself in order to create the best balance for your child, and so he doesn’t have to suffer from your pain. I don’t think any mother could imagine her child being taken away from her. Sometimes it’s necessary.”
In the Dangerous Liaisons prequel, The Seduction, a major HBO Max series, you have star billing as it follows the rise to power of your character, the Marquise de Merteuil, played by Glenn Close in Stephen Frears’ 1988 movie. Did you see it?
“Yes of course, because Glenn Close is such an icon and such a great actress that I had to inspire myself from her. But I also watched the Valmont version, and the one that I really like is Roger Vadim’s 1959 adaptation with Jeanne Moreau as Merteuil. It’s interesting that they spoke in such a contemporary way and I love Jeanne Moreau.
“But yeah, it was insane to be cast in The Seduction. It was great to work again with Jessica [Palud, director] and we were talking every day during the editing. It’s from the point of view of Merteuil, and we are following her. We start when she’s 16 and we finish when she’s in her mid 20s.”
Is it sexy?
“Yes, it’s erotic.”
And it’s with Lucas Bravo, the chef from Emily in Paris.
“Yes, he plays Gercourt, Noee Abita plays Madame de Tourvel [Michelle Pfeiffer in Frears’ movie], Diane Kruger plays Madame de Rosemonde and Vincent Lacoste is Valmont.”
How did Bong Joon Ho come to cast you in Mickey 17?
“I met Director Bong in Venice, because he was the president of the jury when we were showing Happening. Months later, I received an email saying that they wanted me to do a self-tape for his next project. I had to talk about myself. I didn’t know what to say, but it worked! I am a huge fan of his movies, and I never imagined one day that I could work with him, because he feels so far away from what I do. It was the biggest project of my career. But I really believe in destiny, and I think it was my path and I’m just following it. Though in the beginning it was hard, because I was focusing on my accent and I was focusing on the English.”
How did the experience compare to making The Count of Monte Cristo?
“The Count of Monte Cristo was easier because it’s in French. I mean, I had to build the accent, which was different because it’s my Mum’s accent, so I worked with her. She helped Pierre Niney [who plays the Count] with his accent too. It was a good experience, because we were so involved in the story. It was such a spectacular movie.”
And it was a huge French box office hit. Do you want to do more blockbusters like that?
“Sure, but mixed with independent movies. I’ve always been fascinated by Scarlett Johansson, Penelope Cruz and Cate Blanchett, who can do small independent movies, and then go somewhere else on a bigger set.”
Why did you want to do Being Maria, which might be considered a smaller movie?
“When I read the script, I immediately fell in love with Maria Schneider and I felt her pain. I felt the silence that she experienced throughout her life, because she was very much put aside. I tried to give her voice back to her so that it could be heard. As an actress, I also wanted to portray a woman through many phases of her life – you have the drug thing and the addiction, and Last Tango in Paris was interesting because we had to recreate some scenes, and I had to talk the way she spoke. It was interesting for me to mould into that.”
Have you ever met Sebastian Stan who like yourself was born in Romania? [Anamaria left for France at the age of six.]
“No, but I wish I could. I mean it’s interesting, because his story is pretty close to mine. His mother went to another country to build something different for her and her child and that’s what my parents did. When he said, “Romania, I love you!” at the Golden Globes, I really felt it, because I also have this very tender relationship with my country.”
Adam’s Sake screens at The Brisbane International Film Festival on 27 and 30 November 2025, click here for more information.
The Seduction streams on HBO Max from 14 November 2025
