'Vampire Diaries' star doubles up

Nina Dobrev personally is making sure nothing gets lost in translation on The Vampire Diaries.

With a little help from her mom, that is.

Dobrev and her mother worked on the Bulgarian dialogue that was used in the most recent new episode to air (Nov. 11). The 21-year-old Dobrev is Bulgarian-Canadian, having been born in Bulgaria but raised in Toronto.

"I called my mom, and she and I translated it," Dobrev said of the Bulgarian dialogue in the episode titled Katerina.

"I think the writers had used an internet translator and it was so funny. All those online translators are never right. So we did it. I translated my own dialogue, but I called my mom just to confirm I was right.

"I worked really, really hard on that (episode)," added Dobrev, on the phone last week during a rare day off from shooting. "I really got to play the four different characters. And it was great to play the innocence of pre-vampire Katherine, when she was just a normal human."

Dobrev has been particularly busy with dual roles this season on The Vampire Diaries, which airs Thursdays on CW and A.

There's the sweet but plucky teen Elena, who has inspired the devotion of vampire brothers Stefan (Paul Wesley) and Damon (Ian Somerhalder). But there also is the vampire Katherine, who previously inspired the devotion of Stefan and Damon before she turned them into vampires themselves.

When Dobrev mentioned "four characters," she wasn't exaggerating. There's Elena; there's modern-day Katherine; there's 1800s Katherine, seen many times in flashbacks; and now 1400s Katherine and her Bulgarian dialogue has been added to the fray. With regard to all the heavy lifting, Dobrev said she's fortunate everything has happened gradually.

"I've done it in small baby steps," Dobrev said. "I've been given a lot of opportunities in different parts of my life, starting in Toronto with Degrassi, then the bit parts in movies that I did, and now The Vampire Diaries.

"But even with this TV show, I signed on to play the one character and it slowly got bigger and bigger, and more and more. They kind of eased me into two pretty intense roles."

Elena and Katherine are so different that the producers of The Vampire Diaries easily could have tweaked the story and simply hired a second actress.

True, the fact that Elena and Katherine are doppelgangers is central to the plot now. But with only slight alterations to the tale, their connection could have been about blood lines and similar looks rather than identical looks.

Alas, they decided to go with "Dobrev times two", which obviously creates an acting challenge.

"One of them has been on the earth for only, what, 17, 18 years? And the other one has been around for 500-plus years," Dobrev said. "That's a little bit of a difference.

Katherine is more worldly and even the clothing affects the way I act.

"If I put on a pair of heels, I start walking differently and it holds true to Katherine. But if I'm in Converse (running shoes) and jeans and a T-shirt, I feel very much like Elena."

To sum up, Nina Dobrev is playing Elena, three Katherines, and is serving as an unofficial translator on The Vampire Diaries. So Dobrev must be getting at least double, if not quadruple or quintuple the pay, right?

"Uh ... can't comment on that," Dobrev said. "But I'm working really hard."