​Every day the possibility of life on Mars is closer to becoming reality. ​The second season of National Geographic’s captivating series MARS delves further into the looming future ahead. At a recent luncheon with the cast and production team we had the opportunity to learn more about this fascinating television series​ that seamlessly blends ​elements of scripted fiction with documentary sequences. We sat down with Award winning actress Anamaria Marinca to learn more about her character, the series, and the her fascinating life story.

Anamaria Marinca in her film debut as Otilia in the Golden Palm winning drama  “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”

Born in Romania to a father who was a university acting teacher, and a mother who was a professional violinist, Anamaria Marinca was destined for life on the stage. After studying the violin since the age of six years old, it was at seventeen that she opted to change professions and follow in her father’s footsteps. Beginning with international theater stages, Marinca received the Best Actress BAFTA in 2005 for playing Elena in the British mini-series “Sex Traffic.” She made her cinema debut in 2007. Having already appeared in Francis Ford Coppola’s “Youth Without Youth,” she continued a series of international collaborations, including “The Countess,” “Storm,” “Europa Report” and “Fury,” where she performed along Brad Pitt and Shia LaBoeuf.

Her work in theater includes productions in Romania, France, and the UK. She has appeared in many films and TV series including “The Last Enemy,” the 2014 Golden Globe nominee “The Missing,” “Hinterland,” and “River,” to name a few. Marinca’s most recent characters on the big screen are Doctor Dahlin in “Ghost in The Shell,” and Silvia in “NICO, 1988,” which won Best Orizzonti film in Venice this year.

Anamaria Marinca is Dr. Marta Kamen in National Geographic’s MARS

Now Marinca returns for the second season of MARS in the role of Dr. Marta Kamen. It’s been five years, and the doctor’s painstaking and patient search for traces of life on Mars finally bore fruit. The byproducts of her discovery were just as sweet—fame and, more critically, funding—enough to devote the intervening years to studying and characterizing this newfound microbe. But now the pressure is mounting for more results, including answers to questions of universal import: Is there more life on Mars? And, is it a second genesis? Kamen’s given up a lot for her research—more than her colleagues realize—so she’ll go to any length at any price to maintain success.

HOMBRE: What can you tell us about your character, and her development between last season and this season?
Anamaria Marinca: Her name is Marta Kamen, a Russian mission exobiologist and geologist. I would describe her as a joyful pessimist. I’m very attached to my character after almost three years now. You called me a rebel spirit after seeing the clip, and I’ll cling to that, because who doesn’t like to be called a rebel. I am her, while I’m filming at least. They’re all dreamers, they’re all people who are able to sacrifice themselves for an idea, and I think there’s a very fine line between a dream and losing your life. I’m talking about our astronauts in real life. Every trip outside the orbit defines their limits and our limits. In our series it’s survival of the human race, the biggest dream we can hope for the future.

H: How did you prepare for the role?
AM: When I was first cast I had done one sci-fi movie and I had a bit of an idea about space. I had spoken with astronauts to prepare for the part before this series. For this series we had the opportunity to have a two-week boot camp with no other than Dr. Mae Jemison, (MARS scientific advisor; Former NASA astronaut). I went back to school. We had to prepare, we had tests at the end. And I was very nervous I remember not sleeping the night before, and I’m not joking. I felt like I was back in school and I’m very grateful to Dr. Jemison. We had the opportunity to find out the wonderful thing about traveling in space and the effect that it has on the human spirit. The body and the mind. It helped a lot in creating this person because behind the skills there is a human being. We are very interested as actors to create a human and transmit emotions.

H: What can viewers expect this season?
AM: It’s a step up. Because we’re more familiar with the planet itself, with our hearts, with our relationships. There is a very concrete antagonist. Another force we have to meet and confront. It’s about exploitation versus exploration and two very different views of the world we’re living in. We won’t change the will to make money no matter the price, and that is scary. Someone said in the show said that preservation is going against the tide of history, and that’s a very scary idea because it’s the truth. In our history when we look at progress, preservation was the last thing we had in mind.

H: On a personal level, what made you become an actress?
AM: I think probably seeing my father on stage. My father is an actor, my mother is a musician, she’s a violinist. I was a violinist until I was seventeen. When I was seventeen I was going to the cinema, seeing movies from 9 o’clock in the morning. That made me dream. And I thought, I feel a lot sitting on a chair and one day I want to be part of that. I started with theater because in Romania we didn’t have a film industry at the time. Then life somehow responded to this dream, this passion of mine, and gave me the opportunity to not only do theater but be in the movies. I started studying acting with my father. I studied for four years at the university, and he was my teacher as well. Looking back that’s an amazing story, it’s already been a long time now.

Anamaria Marinca in New York City for the premiere of MARS

H: You won a major award in your first acting role, and have been working consistently since then; what advice can you offer to someone who wants to develop a similar career?
AM: It’s never about having a career in arts. It’s maybe having a vocation, if its not too big a word. It’s about finding what you really want to do in life. That’s very difficult for most of us. I feel very lucky somehow that this idea came to me and I’m positive now that this was the right choice for me. Kids today if they want to become actors they should do it if they can’t do anything else but that. If everything within is driving them towards this. Also today it’s very important to be many things, not only an actor. It would be very important for them to generate their own work and focus on telling stories that we can all learn from them.