As the WhatsApp call connected, Greta greeted me immediately, the warmth coming through her soft lilting voice, “Hello! How are you?”
We dive straight in and Greta revealed her love of the creative arts started as a child, “I think for as long as I can remember, I’ve always performed and was part of a drama class every Saturday.”
Everything changed when Greta was accepted into the prestigious RADA (Royal Academy of the Dramatic Art) Youth Company at 16, joining the likes of Tom Hiddleston, and legendary icons, Anthony Hopkins and Glenda Jackson.
She stated, “A real life changing moment, because it was there, I started this community of writers and actors. I was introduced to writing like Federico Garcia, and the last plays, I got lost in their voices and their ideas.”
Prior to RADA, Greta’s film debut was none other than Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, giving her a taste of the world she was working towards. She laughed and reminisced fondly, “To be honest, I was 13 at the time, I was just so thrilled to be out of school and in the creative world of costume, hair and makeup, just being part of something so big, I loved it.”
At the same time, Greta also immersed herself into the world of poetry by attending open mic nights. She stated, “I was able to really edit my work and find a community of writers who helped guide me and pushed me along the way, and gave me the confidence.”
Since then, Greta has released 10 collections of poetry, as well as being commissioned by the National Poetry Library to write a group of poems for their Odyssey series, and Pierpaolo Piccioli to write 10 love poems for his FW19 collection at Valentino.
More recently, she wrote a poem for Chanel to celebrate the launch of their latest perfume from their Les Exclusifs de Chanel collection, COMÈTE. A dream partnership for any fashion enthusiast and certainly not an everyday occurrence.
Bashfully, Greta said, “Well, I’ve been collaborating with Chanel for a while. I was so inspired by everything they do – the artistry behind everything. The head perfumist talked to us about how he came up with the smell of the shooting star fragrance, he said he wanted to find something powdery. There’s just so much that goes on behind the perfume, I’m always amazed. So much of what they do is inspired by the natural world, like the ingredients they use.”
She continued, “When I got commissioned by Chanel to write the poem for a new fragrance called COMÈTE like the shooting star. I was thinking about the line in the poem, it says ‘Before there was anything, there were the stars touching time with hope, ancient light living on ancient light.’
It’s this idea that the stars are prehistoric and before we were here, they were there existing in light, there were these sort of symbols of hope. There’s another line that says ‘Before there was anything, love was bigger than darkness, always there, waiting in the darkness with candlesticks’. We just need to look up to remember that the stars which were falling, have been there before us and you know are these symbols of hope living in darkness, existing almost in candlelight. I guess it kind of inspired this poem. And the name was called ‘At Night The Flowers Read The Day In Fallen Things’.”
Through her acting journey, Greta also delved into film-making. She explained how that came to be, “I was lucky enough to be able to perform in quite a few indie projects, that were collaborative. I was able to learn how to do things behind the camera, as well as in front, it allowed me to understand the whole making of making a film.”
It’s an exciting year for Greta, with a new collection of poetry, Who Will Make The Fire, and feature film, Tell That To The Winter Sea, both out by the time this goes to print. The morning of our conversation, Greta is preparing for the premiere of Tell That To The Winter Sea the following day.
When asked about how she was feeling about the run up to release, there was a feeling of detached excitement, she explained, “It’s quite nice in a way because we’ve had a bit of time. We shot it about two summers ago so there’s a bit of distance between making it and then bringing it out, we’ve forgetten about the intensity of putting it all together.”
Who Will Make The Fire has been four years in the making and is a beautiful ode to nature. Greta reveals, “A lot of poems in the new collection are about the circularity of nature and uncovering the secret circle of the garden and the fleeting moments woven together, and existing within circles. I think a lot about the literal cycle of a flower, but then also, the cycle of Mother Earth and it rotating on this axis of 24 hours of light, so there’s this cycle that we all live in.”
She added, “I went to a poetry reading recently, and Oliver Harrison who has a new collection of poetry coming out, he said, this line, ‘death is good for the garden.’ It really struck me, maybe it’s since moving to the countryside, but I’m really aware of these cycles, like the first white snowdrops in January lighting up the dark mornings… and then then they’re gone, within two weeks, and then it’s something else.”
Hearing Greta’s take on nature was so profound and intimate. What she’s created is a beautifully nuanced collection of words that will invoke connection within ourselves and Mother Earth, to take a moment and be present before you miss one of nature’s wonders.
She continued, “Even our heart cycle, the heartbeat, the female menstrual cycle, we are living within this balancing act of brokenness in a way. The impermanence of it all, I like the open ended-ness of how things can be a vulnerable reality that brings it all back together to the things that matter. Connected to the child within a compassionate person that just wants to be loved and an antidote to the digital world. Everything comes back to the garden.”
With storytelling at the pulse of everything Greta does, I was keen to discover if there was a particular medium that she preferred.
She took a moment and replied thoughtfully, “I guess acting and poetry are two art forms where I feel like I’m able to express the complex needs of the internal monologue I’m having with myself. I love the route of independent filmmakers and writers who tell stories that sit with the characters, staying with them in rooms and telling stories about people rather than a big plot.”
She continued, “I like being able to tell simple stories but with the complexities of people. I’m drawn to the unspoken dialogue within performing and performing these characters but writing is a much more personal truth of self. I guess filmmaking and poetry come hand in hand for me.”
She added, “Writing it’s a very happy, internal translation of sorts. In acting, you’re visually translating, through movement, and through facial expressions, it’s about staying in the moment, whereas poetry, in a way, is about collecting the brokenness of life, and finding a way for the words and phrases of life to exist together on a page. Acting is very much that internal monologue and how you would make it visual, whereas, the writing process is very much about trying to explain the unexplainable and finding the magic within the mundane. Looking at something again and again and revealing the truth of it.”
You can see all of these elements masterfully woven together in Hurt By Paradise, Greta’s debut film as a multi-hyphenate, wearing the hats of writer, director and actor. It was nominated for the Michael Powell Award for Best British Feature Film, Best Performance at Edinburgh International Film Festival and Best UK Feature Film at Raindance Film Festival.
The film explores themes of feeling like an outsider, Greta elaborated, “There’s a loneliness in this character, she’s a single parent, a writer trying to get her work published. You see her walking through the city at night and looking at the mundanity of the world and the bleakness through her internal monologue, you hear this more poetic soundtrack to her vision of things – it’s much more alive, vivid and awake.”
She added, “I very much wanted to show the contrast in what looks bleak and the optimism that we all hold inside of us. I wanted to show a visual reminder that within us, there is this beautiful child that lives inside of all of us.”
When asked about all her nominations, Greta’s response was remarkably humble, “It went to the Edinburgh Film Festival and it was nominated for the Michael Powell up against The Souvenir by Joanna Hogg, who is one of my favourite directors, so it was a really big surprise to be honest.”
She continued, “When you’re making it, you’re making it just for the art of it, you hope that someone watches it but you’re focused on trying to get it made because filmmaking is such a collaboration, it involves so many different people, it really is a communal effort and it’s such a miracle when a film is even made, especially an independent one. It just felt really special to have all those nominations for the first film. It gives you the confidence in some ways to keep going because so much of the creative process can be very lonely.”
@gretabellamacina
All Fashion throughout from CHANEL Spring Summer 2024 Ready-To-Wear collection
All Jewellery by CHANEL Fine Jewellery and Watches
Team Credits
Photographer
Arved Colvin-Smith
Stylist
Jennifer Michalski-Bray
Make-Up Artist
Kay Montana using CHANEL Beauty
Hair Stylist
Raphael Salley at Saint Luke Artist using Sam Mcknight products
