Rising Star Actress Steffi Thake On The Five Things You Need To Shine In The Entertainment Industry

Learn your lines as much as possible before starting rehearsals and go in with some ideas. Hopefully, you’ll be in a welcoming and collaborative environment that encourages you to try different things and play around.

As a part of our series about pop culture’s rising stars, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Steffi Thake.

Steffi Thake is a Malta-born and bred actress who gained fame in the independent thriller MACHINATION. She next works with Russell Crowe. The sky’s the limit for this actress.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?

Sure! I’m born and raised on the island of Malta. My parents are Maltese, but I grew up with English as my first language. I attended an English-speaking school that gave a lot of importance to the arts and, thanks to that, my first experience on stage was when I was 3!

Growing up in Malta was great! It’s a small, beautiful island with lots of sun and beaches. Family is always close by (particularly with my grandparents living right on top of us).

With an older brother, a younger sister, and loads of cousins, there was never a dull moment.

My dad ran a video game store selling PC, Nintendo, Atari and PlayStation games and consoles, so we all grew up playing all sorts of video games. This was a significant part of our childhood! My brother, sister and I all still love playing video games 😊

We were also lucky enough to travel a least once a year! Travel is another aspect of life that’s super important to me.

Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?

As I mentioned, I’ve been on stage since I was 3, but as I grew older, school seemed to get more difficult (not just academically but socially too). I found huge comfort in my Dance and Drama classes. They helped me come out of my shell and discover physical and emotional freedom. Exploring different movements and various characters allowed me to examine who I was and who I wanted to be.

Later on, when I was 20, I met a couple of lovely people who saw something in me and invited me to attend acting workshops at the Malta Amateur Dramatic Club (MADC); that is where my professional career in Malta began (more about this below).

My grandfather (Charles Thake) was also a famous Maltese actor, and even though my career in acting began when he was retiring, he’s still been a monumental inspiration for me. He touched the hearts of so many people — I wish I could even start to fit into his shoes.

Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

I recently worked on a film where I had a small scene with Russell Crowe. A colleague and I were cast as Rowdy Women in a 19th Century British bar, and we had to flirt with the men in the room and then eventually with Russell’s character. The director gathered us all together, we blocked the scene, and then moved out of the space to allow the crew to set up for the shot. As I moved away, Mr. Crowe approached me, grabbed me by the shoulders, looked me dead in the eyes and said ‘Everything’s going to be fine. Don’t be scared. We’re going to go in there and have fun, play the moment and enjoy ourselves. It’s going to be great. Just relax and be in the moment.’ I couldn’t really comprehend what was happening in that moment because that’s the last thing I expected to happen! But I truly appreciated that he took the time to connect with me and reassure me before the scene!

Later on, we were filming some background shots, and the director had a camera on us sitting at a table gesturing and chatting about Russell. We didn’t have any lines, so we just improvised a whole conversation. The director loved it! He invited us over to the cast and crew wrap party and we spent the whole evening at the director’s table, chatting about films, books, and life! It was great!

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Colin Willis had pulled me aside at a friend’s engagement party, said that I’ve got a real presence about me and invited me to join those workshops at the MADC. The workshop really re-ignited my passion for performing!

During one workshop session, I met his partner Nanette Brimmer who encouraged me to audition for that year’s Christmas pantomime. She cast me as a chorus member in my first professional acting job! I learned so much from her about commitment, passion, and developing a great work ethic. If I hadn’t met Colin and Nanette, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be here today!

You have been blessed with great success in a career path that can be challenging. Do you have any words of advice for others who may want to embark on this career path, but seem daunted by the prospect of failure?

Challenging is an understatement. It’s demanding work and genuinely tough to push yourself to new heights. It requires constant training, networking, and self-awareness.

I remember at the beginning of my career, I would accept every role that came my way. I then started to filter through the kinds of roles and projects that I loved and the ones I didn’t. I discovered what direction I wanted my career to take.

Let me tell you, this is a career with more rejection than success, and most of the time your turndowns will have nothing to do with your audition performance. I can’t tell you how many times I was just too tall for a role, or didn’t look Mediterranean enough, or someone else just fit in better with the rest of the cast.

You’ve just got to have faith and confidence in yourself and your talent to keep pushing forward. One of the most important things I learned along the way is ‘You Are Enough’.

What drives you to get up every day and work in TV and Film? What change do you want to see in the industry going forward?

Passion for creating something new with a group of like-minded people is what I love most about this industry. Whether you’re on a big budget or low budget movie/TV show/commercial/stage production … you’re working with people who want to create something amazing! Something that’s going to touch the people who watch it. That’s my drive and my inspiration. I want to be able to work as an international actor full-time — that’s my main ambition. Let’s see how that goes!

The industry in Malta is still fledgling, so there’s a lot of room to grow. I think it’s finally going in the right direction, but it’s taken a lot of struggle for a lot of people to get to this point. We’re still nowhere close, but we’ll get there. 😊

You have such impressive work. What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? Where do you see yourself heading from here?

I’ve got a small role in a Swedish feature film coming up soon! Very excited about that. Other than this, I’ve got another project in the pipeline which I can’t wait to start working on.

I’m currently looking to focus on more international work — my biggest challenge to date 😊

We are very interested in looking at diversity in the entertainment industry. Can you share three reasons with our readers why you think it’s important to have diversity represented in film and television? How can that potentially affect our culture and our youth growing up today?

I love how much more diverse the industry is getting, but there’s still a long way to go. People have looked to their screens for comfort, inspiration, entertainment, and self-discovery for over 100 years! If we don’t see ourselves accurately depicted on these screens, how could we possibly feel validated?

If we don’t depict gender, race, ethnicity, social status and economic status accurately, we are doing a huge disservice to REAL people. All the while negatively influencing people’s perceptions of these genders, ethnicities, etc.

What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why? Please share a story or example for each.

1. I wish I knew it was okay to say “No”. At the beginning of my career, as I mentioned, I took on every role that I was offered, as long as I had nothing else going on that wouldn’t allow me to be 100% committed. In hindsight, there are a few projects I didn’t need to do — but I take them as life lessons!

2. Wear skin-coloured underwear for costume fittings.

3. Learn your lines as much as possible before starting rehearsals and go in with some ideas. Hopefully, you’ll be in a welcoming and collaborative environment that encourages you to try different things and play around.

4. Most of the time it’s okay to improvise and veer off script a little — just clear it with your director first.

5. Don’t take yourself too seriously :)

Can you share with our readers any self-care routines, practices or treatments that you do to help your body, mind or heart to thrive? Please share a story for each one if you can.

I am a huge advocate of self-care! I take regular holidays because I love what travel does to me. There’s something about exploring new places, eating different food and relaxing in nature that just re-centres me like nothing else.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Understanding is the first step to acceptance, and only with acceptance can there be recovery.” — J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

I never read the Harry Potter books (please don’t kill me), so I actually figured this out for myself. I’ve been living my life by it for as long as I can remember — it applies to everything!

I also find it super helpful to keep in mind when building a character! If I don’t understand or sympathise with my character on some level, then I probably shouldn’t play the role.

You are a person of huge influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

I wouldn’t consider myself a person of huge influence! Haha!

Although, it sounds cliche, but, I wish we could all be nicer to each other and the planet we share. If we could get the world to be less greedy and focus more on giving back to others and the earth, the world would be a better place.

Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!

I’m inspired by a lot of different people, but I would love to have lunch with either Julia Garner or NcutiGatwa. Both of these actors blow my mind, and I would love to have a chat with them.

Are you on social media? How can our readers follow you online?

I am! You can find me on Instagram @effistay and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/SteffiThakeActor

This was so informative, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!