Actress Carme Elías announces that she suffers from Alzheimer’s: “After a long and painful journey, the unspeakable word arrives”

The Catalan actress Carme Elías, 71 years old and with an extensive career in theater, cinema and television, has announced that she suffers from Alzheimer’s. The interpreter has revealed it this Saturday when receiving the special award Jordi Solé Tura at the ‘Brain Film Fest’, an event dedicated to exploring the capacities of the mind and which is held at the Barcelona Center for Contemporary Culture (CCCB).

“Finally, after a long and painful tour of doctors, pillsfears, uncertainty and a lot of courage, the unspeakable word arrives: Alzheimer”, declared Elías, who thanked the Pasqual Maragall Foundation, which promotes this festival, for inviting it “to give visibility and leave testimony of a disease that He still has a reverse gear.”

The actress has given a very emotional speech in which she has narrated her discovery of the disease, from the moment she began to feel the first symptoms, although doctors initially attributed them to stressuntil the arrival of the diagnosis.

“At first it is difficult, because there are no external signs, but little by little you find that you’re shooting a movie and you can’t continue with the text. First your memory subtly fails you and then, in a more forceful way, “she has expressed.

After confessing that in his latest film, ‘The Consequences’, he encountered times when he “couldn’t speak”the words did not come out and terror possessed his bodyand that stage fright took hold of her, she has admitted that her complicity with the director helped her move forward.

The actress, who received a round of applause from the public at the end of her speech, regretted “the perversity” of a disease “that has no cure”which “takes your being out of you” and “takes you to nothing”, and has launched a message of solidarity for families who “are spectators of the agony” of their loved one.

From the festival management, Albert Solé, Neus Rodríguez and Cristina Maragall thanked Carme Elías for her courage and generosity, “who helps dignify and normalize Alzheimer’s disease“, and they have stated “that it is necessary to respect the right of each person to decide if they want to make their diagnosis public.”

The actress, who began her theatrical career in 1974, standing out especially on the Catalan scene, is popular for series such as ‘Anillos de oro’, ‘Turno de oficio’ or ‘Heirs’. In the cinema, she acted in ‘The stunned king’by Imanol Uribe; ‘The flower of my secret’by Pedro Almodóvar, or ‘Rough Winds’by Gerardo Herrero.

Winner of a Goya and a Gaudí of honor, among other awards, this Saturday the interpreter received the Jordi Solé Tura Special Award from a festival organized by the Pasqual Maragall Foundation. The contest has screened ‘The Consequences’, a thriller directed by Claudia Pinto (2021) in which Elías intervenes.