Artan Puto (Çelo)
Recollections 

PictureArtan Puto as Çelo (2nd from left) in Tomka.
Some time ago, with the help of Facebook, I managed to find and friend Herion Mustafaraj. For Albanian children of the 1970s and 1980s he was inseparable from his character Beni, from Beni Walks on His Own (1975), one of Xhanfise Keko’s most loved films, which won several national and international awards.

For me, the memories  of Herion that I hold dearest are those of our time together in the town of Berat, where we were room mates for two months of location shooting when we filmed Tomka and His Friends during the summer of 1977. I started my search for my former co-stars with Herion because he had long "disappeared from circulation " – he had emigrated to America .

I had remained in contact with several of my other co-stars from Tomka,  including the popular movie actors Enea Zheku  and Genci Mosho. Genci  and I, in fact, had never lost contact, and we often meet in Tirana.  But, it was nearly 20 years until I talked to Enea again. These friendships and these memories, that we are now sharing thanks to the renewed interest in the life and work of Xhanfise Keko and in Albanian cinema, would never have come to exist without the beloved woman who is the connection between us all- Teta Xhano.

When I heard the news of  her death in December 2007 on TV, two specific memories spontaneously  came flashing back before my eyes: when I saw  her for the first time, and when I heard her voice for the last time. I cannot  explain why I thought  of these two moments in particular, but perhaps it is because  when a loved one leaves us we instinctively seek to understand  the essence of their presence in our life.

I met Teta Xhano in 1976 when I was just  ten years old attending the fourth grade elementary school  "Kosovo, " which no longer exists today.  It was in 1976 that I was chosen  by her  to play in her film The Sounds of War,  in a role that was more or less episodic . As with all  the kids selected in this  first audition, I had to pass a screen test. I remember that I was a timid child and had it not been for a classmate of mine who came with me to the tryouts, I would not have gone at all. For the audition, we were a group of three friends improvising about wanting to go and see a movie. I am not in the position to judge  my performance  that day, but in the end the finger fell on me and on several other children, so, from that point on we were considered actors, although filming had not started yet .

 I remember that when we started filming The Sounds of War in Durrës , the daily life of the whole city came to a halt , and all eyes were  upon us: a small troupe of actors and film technicians who recreated  scenes of a former world in their city. Shooting on location outside the Kinostudio was a novelty for the people of Durrës. For hours without moving , the residents of Durrës watched the  actors get into their makeup and costumes and transform into their characters. The  heavy equipment needed to shoot the film--lights, shop tables, sets, props, outfits, etc.--it was an exciting new world for me too.   Equally fantastic was to see how well the film team worked under the direction of a woman.  This was the first occasion when I saw a woman in a position different than  what we were accustomed to at home: the figure of the grandmother, or mother, dealing with household chores and just going to  work  in a factory, or a shop, or as a teacher, and so on.  I was enamored with Teta Xhano, and so pleased to have been chosen by her.

However , the full recognition would come a year later , in the spring of 1977 , when she chose me for the role of Çelo, one of the four protagonists of the film Tomka and His Friends. I remember the moment well , because filming would take place in the town of Berat rather than in Tirana or its outskirts, several months before the film was scheduled to go into production, she came to my house to convince my father to let me take part in the film. Unlike The Sounds of War  that was shot over the summer in nearby Durrës, participation this time would mean, among other things, taking time off  from school  (and my father was a professor!). But, Teta Xhano promised that even while shooting the film, the child actors would attend classes in a school in Berat. And, thus began for me a fantastic journey! The  freedom to run away from home at the age of eleven. Freedom to play with friends and see places that I had only dreamed of seeing. It was not the first time that I had traveled in Albania, but it was the first time I went on a two month holiday without my parents!
It was also the first time I really understood what it meant to work as an actor in a movie. It is often a tedious job, and not nearly as glamorous as we had imagined. I will never forget that sunny day, maybe it was one of the last days of April 1977, when we all  got on the bus  to the  town of Berat.  The Kinostudio bus carried all of the cast and crew  of Tomka, including  our beloved dog Luli. We kids were inseparable  from Luli. Following the bus with cast and crew were  trailers full of cameras, lights, sets, props, and costumes that we would  use during the filming of the movie that would turn us into poor kids from Berat  circa 1943 during a pivotal moment in World War II. My recollection of Teta Xhano during that road trip is also fixed in my memory. Seated at the front of the bus, with a book in hand. It was the most beautiful trip of my childhood!

When I began  thinking about writing down these memories of Teta Xhano, I found some  boxes of old photos, and one  of the photos shot on location in Berat is  very special to me. It is a picture where my face looks " bloody " ... This photo was taken during the shooting of a scene in Tomka  where a German officer catches my character Çelo trying to enter the German camp (to help get information for the Albanians), and he then beats me to make an example of me to  the other children. During the shooting of this scene, I remember that, more than Teta Xhano’s eyes, I saw her hands directing me and consoling me. At the end of that long day, Teta Xhano’s hands caressed my face, and I fully believed that they were the hands of a parent  who loves their child and comes to praise them for their good work and caress away their physical suffering. More often, for a child, the hands of parents and elders and teachers are those that give us orders, tasks, tips and a pat, but I had never experienced the hands of an adult trying to communicate and dialogue with me in this way.

On  an evening in late October 1977, those same hands would lead all of the children of Tomka, one by one, as we young actors were introduced to the public of Berat where the film premiered.

It is hard to convey what life was like for Albanian children of the 1970s to those who did not grow up in our culture. For better or for worse, it was a simpler life in many ways. We moved through the city streets and alleys, playing ball in open fields, as there were very few highrises. There were also very few cars and the narrow streets were clean and easily passable for children. Life, even in the capital city of Tirana in those years was quite tranquil, we didn’t have much compared to what children in Western Europe or the US had at the time, but we made do.  Even buying new clothes each year could be a struggle for some of the families I grew up with. But for the children of Teta Xhano,  life took an entirely different course. We had a bond with each other, because our lives were undoubtedly different than those of the average Albanian child. We also held the burden of this privilege, but as children we were not able to fully understand some of the frustrated feelings that came along with our special circumstances.  We had the privilege of having been chosen for the beautiful "game" of cinema.  And from that point forward, it was always part of our  frame of reference. I would say things like, " Ah , yes, this was before the movie ,"  or, "At that time , I had just finished the movie." It was a remarkable twist of fate to have been brought together to to work with Teta Xhano.

My admiration for Teta Xhano knows no bounds. How can I forget the woman  who gave me the opportunity to be part of this magical world of cinema? The hand that produced these films is the same hand that guided me  and showed me that I could do anything I put my mind to.   It did not cross my mind as a child  that for my peers who were not actors that my chilhood visage would live on long past my  actual youth through Teta Xhano’s films. In her films, our faces would be preserved at thhose tender age—we would always look the same, speak the same line, make the same gestures. As the Albania of the 1970s gave way to more dificult times in the 1980s and 1990s, the nostalgia for those seemingly innocent years would only increase.

As the years passed, Keko’s kids  went their separate ways. Sometimes, we would see each other and Teta Xhano in the streets of Tirana, in bars, or at local events. I still recall her effortless walk,  and her elegant dress when I would see her out and about town. Now that she is gone, I regret that I didn’t get to spend more time with her. In December 2006,  just a year before her death, we had our last spontaneous encounter in Tirana. I was at the funeral of  a friend’s father and she walked into the room. We recognized each other right away. We hugged and then Teta Xhano took one of my hands with both of her hands. My eyes went instinctively to her hands, which I had held so many times as a child. The tables had turned, now it was she who had to take two of her hands to grasp one of mine.
By Artan Puto
Translated and abridged from his chapter in the memorial book Teta Xhano.

Artan Puto was born and raised in Tirana, Albania, where he still makes his home. He is a historian who trained at the University of Tirana, where he now teaches. He also holds a PhD in History from the European University Institute in Florence. He works side by side with the Albanian Ministry of Culture to save and promote Albania's precious archeological heritage, where he is Director of the Agency for  Archaeological Service. In his spare time, he is researching and  writing a book on the role of women in Communist era Albanian cinema.