Talk about a challenging career choice. Eszter Balint has made two - actress in mostly independent films and independent recording artist.
Since leaving acting a half dozen or so years ago, the 36-year-old has focused her creative talents on music, and earlier this year released her second CD, “Mud,” on the Hoboken, New Jersey-based Bar None label. But thanks to her role in director Jim Jarmusch’s
art house classic “Stranger Than Paradise,” Balint’s
name remains on the radar of cult movie aficionados and fans of
the unconventional director’s work.
Her role in “Stranger” led to a handful of other films,
including Steve Buscemi’s directorial debut, “Trees
Lounge,” but with the exception of small roles in Woody Allen’s
“Shadows and Fog” and an episode of “Miami Vice,”
she made little else of note in the mainstream. Living for a spell
in L.A. was the antidote to the acting bug, and Balint began to
fully pursue her musical muse in the mid 1990s.
“I became disenchanted with the film world and what the possibilities
were,” says Balint. “I needed to take control of my
life and it was an inspiring time for music and seemed like a logical
progression.”
That progression from acting to music evolved over the next few
years with Balint pining away in various bands in Los Angeles and
back in New York, singing harmonies and playing violin both in live
performance and on other artist’s recordings. In 2000 she
released her first CD “Flicker.”
UNDER THE INFLUENCES
Born in Hungary, Balint became involved in the arts at a young age.
Her parents were founders of a theater group that captured the attention
of the Hungarian government despite doing plays that were not that
political. The troupe eventually moved to Paris, which served as
home base for a number of years. In the early 1980s, the group -
Eszter included - was invited to perform in a theater festival in
Baltimore, which resulted in the troupe settling in the United States
and setting up shop next to the legendary Chelsea Hotel in New York
City.
Considering her background, it’s somewhat surprising that
Balint’s music has such a rootsy Americana feel to it. Her
sultry vocals add to the mystique of the music and are a perfect
complement to her lyrics, which lean toward the dark side.
Asked about her musical influences, Balint rattles off names like
Dylan, Neil Young, Randy Newman, and the Beatles. “I’m
a song person. I get into good songs even more than cool, interesting
sounds,” she says. Over the years, she’s gone through
different musical phases. “In my late teens and early twenties
I was into opera. Go figure.” Classical music has also been
a big part of her life. She’s played the violin since age
six.
She does listen to new music too and has even gone through a Beck
and Bjork phase. “The reason I constantly go back to the sixties
and seventies stuff is that time was so much more about songs,”
she explains. “When you can [listen] to something ten years
after you first heard it, and there’s still something new
about it because it has its own little mysterious world that lasts
forever.”
As for her own mysterious musical world, Balint creates music that
leaves a lot of open space for the lyrics, her imagination, and
the listener’s imagination, and where what’s not being
said plays as important a role as what’s being said. “There’s
a simplicity and dark mystery to it,” she says.
ALWAYS A STRANGER
Balint has positive memories of “Stranger Than Paradise,”
a film she made when she was just 15 years old. “I think it’s
a great film.God knows I can say that 20 years later.” Although
she concedes it’s been attached to everything she’s
done since then. “It has a wonderful aspect to it and it has
a tiresome aspect to it too,” she admits. “How long
can you talk about the same thing?”
Does she miss acting? “I think about it now and then,”
concedes Balint. “If something great ever came my way I wouldn’t
be dead set against it. But I don’t really yearn for that
as a lifestyle or a career.”
Still, Balint is pragmatic about her acting past. “I was part
of a few great projects but it wasn’t anything I ever consciously
decided to do. A lot of it was happenstance, which is fine because
that’s how a lot of life is.”
THE IMPORTANCE OF NOT BEING EARNEST
When asked if there’s a difference between acting and music,
she responds that the best acting and musical performances require
what she calls a “healthy distance.” “In that
distance is a lot of honesty,” says Balint. “Honesty
is such a dangerous word because I don’t want to sound like
I’m trying to be the earnest songwriter girl,” she explains.
Rather than being “earnest” she says it’s all
about “authenticity.” “It’s always been
important for me to be authentic in my acting and that’s true
for my songwriting.”
Balint acknowledges the hazards of plying the acting and music trades.
“They’re not the easiest rackets,” she says. “But
in music there’s more of a sense of controlling your destiny.
You can do your work no matter what else happens, and that’s
important. I found acting incredibly stifling and frustrating. You
were totally at the mercy of projects that may or may not happen,
or you may or may not like.”
Independent recording artists build an audience one listener at
a time, and Balint has been doing that throughout New York and the
East Coast, the West Coast and Europe touring in support of the
new CD. She plays violin and guitar and performs with a full band
or as a duo with her husband Michael DuClos who plays bass, guitar,
banjo, and shaker. “There’s a lot of texture going on
for two people,” she says describing the duo’s live
sound.
Balint describes her audience is people like herself who appreciate
songs on a basic level. The feedback so far has been positive and
immediate, which she says is one of the nice things about performing
live.
Meanwhile, “Mud” continues to receive positive critical
praises from the likes of Billboard, The New York Times, and Entertainment
Weekly. “I’m flattered by that and that’s definitely
propelling me forward,” says Balint.
Photos courtesy of Merri Cyr
Powered by AkoComment 2.0!
