For Presley Chweneyagae, making "Tsotsi" was more than just a job or a spotlight; it was an act of redemption for a kid from a small poor town from the northwest province of Mafikeng who made the transition from local actor to international star of an Oscar-nominated film.

But thanks to South African director Gavin Hood, this young guy from a tough neighborhood was able to construct the life of a mentally deranged thug ('tsotsi") and criminal gang leader, showing his human side both because of that experience and in spite of it as well.

Q: Were you surprised at how brutal you became when you saw yourself on screen?

PC: Yes, definitely. It was like asking myself, "Are you capable of doing that [laughter]."

Q: Except for Butcher, the gang member who shanked the people, you were a pretty nasty guy.

PC: Yes, I was a pretty nasty, but it's probably because I grew up around guys like him, so it was easy to relate to. Plus, it was just a lot of cut and paste [laughs] of all these people.

PC: You grew up around killers?

PC: Yes. It was tough. There were people stabbing each like in the daylight and stuff like that.

Q: You grew up pretty much after apartheid--how old are you now?

PC: Yeah, pretty much. I'm 21, sir.

Q: Apartheid was more than 10 years ago [the first democratic election was in 1994; the system was coming apart around 1990]?

PC: I was born in a northwest province in 1984.

Q: So you pretty much missed it; was it interesting to talk to people who experienced it?

PC: Definitely. Because I've read books about apartheid, I kind of learned a lot [about it] but people look at me funny because I don't really understand it. I guess that's what you say, like when you go out or someone just calls you a "kafir" [a derogatory word originally meaning non-believer but in connotation meaning "nigger"] you think "Oh so what." It doesn't really get to me the way it does to a person who experienced the whole thing.

Q: What attracted you to this project?

PC: I read Athol Fugard's plays like "Blood Knot" so I had an interest in the beginning. But to realize that the book, "Tsotsi," the real novel, was written by Athol Fugard, I had to read the script twice then I got an interest. I said, "I can play this part. I can find this kind of element in me," if you know what I mean. So it was really that reason, and that I've always had a passion for films, even though I did a lot of theater, because I watched a lot. In that first meeting with Gavin, I realized that he was really passionate about his work and meeting a director like that... what more do you need? I had already prepared a scene for that interview so in the little time we had together I got a gist of what he wanted from his actors, and then I auditioned after that. I said I wanted to read for them both. And he said, "Ok come back and do them both."

Q: Were you familiar with Athol Fugard's work?

PC: I had read a lot of his work at school, just before they kicked me out. It was a technical because I was working and was away for three months. So I read his plays and I've seen his work performed. I've always heard of this good playwright named Athol Fugard when I was growing up. So it was an honor for me to be in his work.

Q: What did you learn from reading his work?

PC: I always like to get that experience. All along when I've read about Athol Fugard and guys like writer/director Barney Simon [founder of The Company—a non-racial theater group—and the Market Theatre] I realized there were more opportunities for black brothers in terms of theatres. They use to do these plays at the Market Theatre [in Johannesburg]. Just after 1994, when I started to get involved in the arts, I used to watch these protest plays, and protest theatre. That kind of theatre didn't really interest me at the time. Then I was interested in Shakespeare, I guess, because I just didn't grow up in that generation so it was hard to relate to it. That's why I don't get bothered when someone just swears at me and he's white. I just say, "Fuck it." I don't really understand the whole thing about apartheid and stuff. But I know there was apartheid and I know there has been controversy and all that but I'm just not there. My mind frame is somewhere else--it's not in the past.

Q: What in your experience helped to do this movie?

PC: I was able to do this because I started acting a long time ago. In 1996, I started doing plays like "Jack in the Box" but it was my mom [who encouraged me] because I grew up in a rough town. So my mom didn't want me to end up like most of the guys I knew, she wanted me to do drama. I did plays like "Red Ball" and later on I did Shakespeare--"Hamlet" and "King Lear"--and when I was doing Hamlet at The State Theater [in the capital city of Pretoria where had had moved when he got this role], an agent saw me there. I was still doing my matric and she said to me, finish your matric first and then we can talk."

Q: Matric[ulation] classes are at the end of high school?

PC: Yeah, that's when I got the script and had a meeting with Gavin. So I asked him if I could do it [the part of] "Tsotsi" and so I auditioned for "Tsotsi" but initially I auditioned for Butcher.

Q: When you two were working together, did you turn to him and get a sense on how to see and experience things?

PC: Yes I felt that experience I had was enough to make me welcome my character. When he told me the story about his mother being robbed and jacked twice. So we did have that but we didn't want to focus on the past. What we focused on was the story in the present. How the history has affected us but we can still do something with it instead of be all pissed off and angry at the world.

Q: How about the transition--was it instinctual because you were trained in theater?

PC: It was Gavin's direction and it was a whole lot of inspired acting and drawing deeply into myself. And I did not think about my character. I wasn't really thinking that the character has to change. I was just following the path. Like where the character goes. I followed the character. It wasn't really something that I thought about.

Q: Were you nervous making a film since you're a theater actor?

PC: [Laughs] When I'm working I don't really think. I just think the character so I don't really. You think about it after and when you look at it it's like, I fucked up. Oh I'm sorry...

BB: It's okay, In America we say fuck a lot.

Q: When you saw yourself on screen were you surprised at your transition?

PC: When they first showed the clips, I walked out. I couldn't look at myself acting because I was feeling like that all over again. So it took sometime before I got use to seeing myself on screen. But still when I look at the screen I don't look at the movie to judge myself or judge other people's performances. In a different eye, but there's nothing I could have said like I should have done that but…I don't know what to say. I can't really say, ok now I can see I'm changing. I can't really think.