Krišjānis Salmiņš

Born: 21 November 1971

Born in Saldus into the family of a lawyer and a teacher, Krišjānis Salmiņš graduated from Irlava Secondary School in Tukums District in 1989. He studied at the Faculty of History and Philosophy of the University of Latvia (1989–1991) and graduated from the acting course led by Juris Rijnieks at the Screen and Theatre Arts Department of the Latvian Academy of Culture in 1997. He has been an actor at Valmiera Theatre since 1997.

Krišjānis was one of only two actors who received Oļģerts Kroders’s wristwatch as a personal memento. Perhaps this was because, during Kroders’s second period at Valmiera Theatre, Krišjānis had become the director’s true stage counterpart—Kroders would hardly have allowed himself a romantic or, heaven forbid, sentimental alter ego.

Salmiņš’s characters look at life with the scepticism and distance of a wise person, only rarely allowing glimpses of drama to emerge through irony (they possess too much of a sense of humour to call even their solitude a tragedy). Ostrovsky’s Vozhevatov, Tennessee Williams’s Wells, Chekhov’s Lopakhin, and to a certain extent even Shakespeare’s Claudius are men who know what should be done for the world to continue moving calmly along its course. Yet no one wishes to listen to the voice of reason, while they themselves are too tired and indifferent to insist. Something of the reflection of these characters can also be found in Andrei Zhivago—the restless soul who senses what is coming and would like to warn others, but whose voice remains unheard.

Another distinctive category of Krišjānis’s roles is that of malicious jesters—such as Ruth, the master of the madhouse, the watchful eye overseeing Zoya’s apartment, or Edmund in King Lear. Yet even within these characters, one can sense their own past suffering and the time when they wished to be different.

Beyond all categories stand two exceptional roles by Krišjānis: Prince Myshkin in Kroders’s production and the young Indrāns in Māra Ķimele’s staging. They confirm that a truly great actor is one who can discover within himself and awaken the entire spectrum of emotions available to human beings.