I was actually quite surprised how many more mythologies there are about mermaids than the ones our society knows. I was so pleasantly surprised for 'Siren' to add quite an original idea to that: One that is a predator. One that is very intelligent but still has to survive in the ocean with all of its challenges.
Eline Powell
I'm a bit of a melting pot, I try to speak British, but there's some European lilt - a not-so-conventional one because I'm Belgian, from the Flemish part. Dutch was my mother language, and I learned English, and I speak French, too.
Nobody will believe in you but yourself, so you have to be on your own side.
Do you ever sit in Starbucks and watch people go by? Everyone has energy around them, and you can tell what kind of person they are just by the way they walk and talk.
In Russia, they have Rusalkis, and they have Selkies in Scotland, and in Fiji, you have a special mention of it. The first earliest mermaid mentioned in history books was Atargartis in Assyria, a thousand B.C... In Africa, you have Mami Wata.
As an actress, nobody is sure these days whether something is going to be successful or not. I tried to always have a good time on set because of that reason. Even if people didn't like it, at least you had a good time.
I had this awesome tennis teacher when I was 12 who was Icelandic. He looked like a Viking: long hair, and he was built like a rock and spoke with this accent.
I think, when I was younger, I'd be crippled sometimes by what others thought or how others would do better. It's been a long journey, and having a lack of confidence is really damaging in this industry.
Hollywood does seem like the holy grail. Not to diminish anything from other countries, but it's the most mainstream and hardest to be a part of because there are so many people in it.
Obviously, portraying a mermaid is a very different kind of work, especially when compared to any other character you'd probably get asked to play in a show.
Every time you come across someone who looks like an outsider, the best way to go about it is to open your mind a little bit. You have to try to understand somebody who isn't like you.
