Art & Creativity Quote by Berenice Bejo

There’s something wonderfully unglamorous about Bejo’s confession: the myth of the actor as a mystical vessel collapses into a practical ritual involving an iPod and a two-minute window. That specificity matters. “Two minutes before” suggests she’s not trying to live inside a character 24/7; she’s describing a quick, controlled switch you can flip when the crew is ready and the camera is rolling. It’s a craft note disguised as casual chatter.

The line also smuggles in a quiet shift from skepticism to belonging. She starts with “Maybe,” a hedge that reads like old resistance to actorly superstition. Then comes “But truly,” a pivot into sincerity, and suddenly she’s joining a tribe she once observed from the outside: “I’ve listened to actors say...” The subtext is professional maturation. She’s moved from hearing anecdotes to building her own pre-shot technology of feeling.

Music here isn’t about inspiration in the abstract; it’s about mood regulation under industrial pressure. Film sets are stop-start machines, and emotions can’t be summoned on a leisurely timetable. “Puts you in the mood and gives you energy” is the blunt, bodily language of someone who understands performance as endurance: you need ignition, tempo, stamina. The iPod becomes a small rebellion against the set’s noise and waiting, a portable atmosphere she can control.

Culturally, it lands in a very contemporary place: the curated playlist as identity, the headphone cocoon as boundary, the idea that “getting ready” is as much about managing attention as it is about accessing emotion. Bejo makes pre-performance prep sound less like magic and more like a hack - which is exactly why it feels honest.