Exclusive Zulfa Maharani Trying To Avoid Typecasts In Horror Characters

Zulfa Maharani (Photo: Karisa Aurelia Tukan, DI: Raga/VOI)

JAKARTA - Zulfa Maharani is not a new name in the world of cinema. At the age of 25, he has stolen attention with various roles and made it easier for him to be in the spotlight.

This year, he started with Tasya's character from the film Marriage Spirit. This film is his latest horror work after finally stealing attention with the film Qorin (2022). According to him, Tasya is an ambitious woman and loves a couple very much which is a challenge in itself.

Lumayan karena aku tidak terlalu bucin sama pasangan jadi aku cukup riset ke teman-temannya yang bucin seperti saya, tapi tidak sulit karena kan reading sama workshop jadi pasti ada riset dan itu sangat memudah, cerita Zulfa Maharani kepada VOI beberapa waktu lalu.

The actress who was born on December 10 was not married, but her character, who has a lot to do with relationships and couples, made her reflect a lot on the idealism of the relationship. In this film, he is paired with Morgan Oey as a married couple.

"In my opinion, when someone decides to get married, not only marrying a partner but the whole family. It's part of the tradition of marriage in Indonesia or Asia, so in my opinion when I find a partner, I will also try to get closer to my family," explained Zulfa.

"It's normal, so I think I'm going to do the same thing but it's not as detailed as what Tasya is doing. In my opinion, Tasya is a really beautiful character!" he said.

This film marks the actress's first 25-year collaboration with director Paul Agusta who is heavily involved in films and acting. On the basis of admiration, Zulfa is interested in returning to play the horror genre through this film.

"From the beginning, I really wanted to work with Paul (August) because it happened that many of my friends had learned acting with Paul Agusta and I also watched several of Paul's projects and I was very interested in working with Paul's brother," he continued.

'Sis Paul is one of the directors that I want to work with and secondly because of the script. The script made me fall in love because previously I had not played horror for 2 years and focused on drama. After the last horror film aired, I decided not to take horror, "he said he admitted that he had received too many similar characters from his last horror film.

He considers one way to continue to develop as an actor is to selectively choose a role. Although relatively young, Zulfa relaxed when sorting out roles so that there is no repetition and continues to grow up as an actress.

"After those two years I got a script for Spirit Marriage and I fell in love with the script, that's what made me have been directed by Paul Agusta and the script is really good. I'm also friends with friends who work together and start work together, so it's really interesting," he said again.

The unforgettable experience felt by the actress who was born in Jakarta. He named the film Marriage Spirit as the healthiest horror shoot. Stereotype that filming takes a long time and is often tiring, all of which are nil from the production he is undergoing this time.

Zulfa Maharani feels that the horror genre in Indonesia is increasingly popular and increasingly varied. This makes creators want to continue to develop horror stories that have been circulating, either original or adaptation. Because of these two things, he also doesn't try to avoid horror in the future.

"I definitely always read scripts. I don't want the same character I've played," he said.

I don't want a typecast and I feel that Indonesian films, especially horror, have started to vary. When the film is varied in genre and theme, it means that the character is automatically varied too. I see now that I've decided to go back to horror again because the theme is varied, so the characters offered to me are very varied," continued Zulfa.

"It's not that I like horror films, but I also always see first from the characters I play, directors, and production values I will definitely see," he said.

The long journey has made a Zulfa Maharani want to continue to maintain her career. The nomination for the Indonesian Film Festival is still committed to taking acting classes even though she has acted in more than 10 films.

"For me, the quality is important. I maintain quality, try to keep learning, that's why I take acting classes or participate in theaters, it's one of the efforts to learn more because I wasn't born or started from acting school or took lectures about acting," said Zulfa.

"I always feel that there will always be new actors, there will always be many new people entering the industry and I think it's okay. I think life in our industry, the more people, not only actors, but the crew also began to regenerate to replace them," he said again.

In addition, he also still has a dream to act in a number of genres. He admitted that he was interested in playing roles in action films or musicals, something he never liked.

"In fact, there are many characters that I want to play, maybe I've never played an action film, wanted to play one time, or a musical. I think it's very, very interesting (both)," said Zulfa closing the conversation with VOI that afternoon.