Lolita in Tehran: “We are proud to be Iranian”

Interview with Golshifteh Farahani and Mina Kavani, two of the main actresses in the film by Eran Riklis, who pays tribute to culture in a drifting society.

Through the power of literature, Read Lolita in Tehran Explore the questions of combating oppression in a tireless quest for freedom. The film ofEran Riklis is to be discovered in the cinema on March 26, 2025. It is Adapted from the bestseller eponym of the novelist Azar Nafisiand tells the story of a professor of the Iranian capital University who, after having been ousted, brings together seven of his students to peel Western literary works. These gatherings take place in secret, a means of resisting the Islamic revolution of the 1980s by celebrating the power of words.

To honor the story of Azar Nafisi, Eran Riklis calls on actresses with exceptional journeys. Zar Amir Ebrahimi (Mashhad nights And Tatami),, Mina Kavani (Red Rose And None bear) And Golshifteh Farahani (Syngué Sabour,, State lies And Paterson) are three exiled actresses. We have met these last two.

First: films on Iran, through a female point of view in particular, are multiplying. The seeds of the wild fig by Mohammad Rasoulof and Tatamico -managed by Zar Amir, were recently in theaters. One has the impression that the news is mobilizing. You are two exiled actresses who played in a film on Iran outside of Iran, what do you think of this speech that is released?

Golshifteh Farahani: I think that if there is a release of speech, it comes from the heart of Iran. It is a huge interior cultural revolution that takes place today. There are demonstrations everywhere. Some young people continue to live despite oppression. The stories we hear about Iran are impossible to believe. Youth and women live and resist inside the country. What we see outside is only a small part of this release. For me, what is impressive is that despite all the invasions, our culture has always managed to survive. Despite 45 years of oppression, a brutal and totalitarian regime, people continue to sacrifice themselves so that culture can exist. It is in these moments that one feels proud to be Iranian because there are not many peoples in this world which can resist also incredibly in front of oppression.

Mina Kavani: It’s true that it’s been a while since it moves and now it only explodes. We lived it when we were in Iran and now we live it differently through the new generation. At one point, it will explode. We expect it impatiently.

GF: The question is not if it will change but when it will change. In 1 year? In 5 years? In 10 years? No matter, it will change.

How was it important for you to defend this project?

MK: It was important for me to play alongside my Golshifteh. It was the first time. It’s incredible because we have known each other for a long time, we are both exiles for all these years and our paths have only met now. Above all, what was important for me was telling the story of all these girls, of all these actresses with whom we had the joy of working. Each has a very different course. For me, it was quite impressive. It was very moving to interpret one of the characters in Azar Nafisi’s novel because I recognized myself very much in Nassrin, my character, who wanted to leave, thinking of his happiness which was elsewhere.

Director Eran Riklis, with whom you have turned The Mona Lina file, Said that the choice of cast was difficult but that you, Golshifteh Farahani, was obvious for the role of Azar Nafisi.

GF: I think I was chosen by Eran because we have already worked together. Then, it seems to me that he took two years to discover the other girls and therefore to bring together the casting of the film.

I have read that you sometimes feel associated with a symbol, in spite of you, which encloses you in certain roles and that you liked to play in comedies like A couch in Tunis by Manele Labidi for example.

GF: For 17 years that I have been in France, I have always refused to play in films related to Iran and I have never spoken in Farsi in any film. I just didn’t want to be locked in a box. But I think the strength of Read Lolita in Tehranit is the whole, all of the forces of girls. It bursts the screen.

What do you think today with the central role you are in this film?

GF: I am nothing. I just amplified the voice of those who have not had the floor in the past two years. I learn more about myself in this film thanks to my compatriots and my sisters. Being among them was one of the greatest gifts that I could receive in particular because we were talking Farsi. I was surprised and upset by playing with Mina. There were times when I watched her and I said to her: “What I feel there, is it true?“They were overwhelming moments. We were a family. To play in a professional way one in front of the other was more than pride. My blood boiled was love.

Golshifteh Farahani: “La Comédie et moi” (interview)

And for you, Mina Kavani, Golshifteh Farahani represents a symbol?

MK: Golshifteh left Iran before me. She was the first. When she left, there were not as many exiled actresses in France or elsewhere. Golshifteh gave hope to younger actresses and artists saying: it is possible, even if we grew up under the regime of the Islamic Republic, it is possible to go outside Iran and work with great directors. She always gives me strength in the moments when I feel a little desperate, tired and that I have the impression that I will not get there. I see Goli and it gives me hope. This is important because the more people like her, the more women will dare to go to what they dream of, what they want to get. Even if we did not take the same path or had the same route, in the end, which is symbolic, and this is precisely what the film says Read Lolita in Tehran : we find ourselves in the same place with the same emotions and the same issues, as if we were the mirror of each other. I was very happy when Golshifteh came to see my show on stage. She said to me: “It was my life”I was proud to hear that. She doesn’t have the same story and yet, when she attended my show, she recognizes herself in me. It is very precious.

You said, the film echoes what is happening in Iran, to the demonstrations “Woman, life, freedom” But is he not going further? Does this film that take place during the 80s not make a universal observation?

MK: The power of this novel is the way Azar Nafisi recounts the strength of literature. This is what touches me the most and that is what is universal precisely. The way in which the characters of novels of different periods in history can upset the fate of young Iranian women in the 1980s. This is where for me it is universal.

A universal observation which concerns many countries where there is a decline in the rights of women. It may be saying that no one is safe regardless of the country in which we live …

GF: Anyway, today when we talk about women in Iran, we talk about women in the world. There is not only, as we say in the film, the big perverts in Iran, there are big perverts everywhere. It’s just that in Iran, it is a totalitarian regime but the problems encountered by women, linked to justice and equality, exist all over the world. Even in the United States, women have enormous problems and books are censored.

Is you culture an effective weapon against political oppression? This is what the film tells us but does it work in real life too?

GF: I really believe in the strength of literature, culture and art in general. Especially for us, Iran is art and culture. This is what we live on. In Mina’s play, who said “I live on stage, I live through the theater”, I recognize my country. Even if we are exiled, Iran is present in art, in the food that we eat together and in the things that we tell. This is why the totalitarian regime burns the books. I remember very well these scenes, I saw them with my own eyes. My father had prohibited works and we knew that it was not necessary to talk about it. gigantic before totalitarian regimes.

What book is your “Lolita” ?

GF: If I had to choose a book, it would be without hesitation The little prince Because I listened to it when I was 3 or 4 years old and my father was doing the fox. It was an audiobook recorded at the time of Shah. This book by Saint-Exupéry is in my unconscious.

MK: If I had to choose one that helped me a little, I would say All men are fatal de Simone de Beauvoir. It is a book that upset me enormously because he talks about death and I live constantly with the presence of death.

Who is Zar Amir Ebrahimi, the actress of the nights of Mashhad awarded in Cannes?