Mexico City, May 15 (EFE).- The Mexican series “Isla Brava”, a thriller about the disappearance of a hotel tycoon that will premiere next Thursday on TelevisaUnivision’s Vix+ platform, paints a portrait of what is forbidden, ambition and inequality, its protagonists agree in an interview with EFE.
Although the mysterious kidnapping of Alfredo, the owner of a luxurious tourist complex on a fictitious island in Mexico, is the engine of the series, love affairs and infidelities dominate a large part of the plot.
Asked about what makes this topic, so hackneyed, continue to arouse public interest, the Mexicans Fernanda Castillo and Erick Hayser answered almost in unison: “That it is prohibited.”
“We see the idea of the forbidden since we were children, and what they tell us ‘don’t touch’ is what we want to touch the most. There is something within us that has to do with the balance between darkness and light, which makes us feel curious and want to explore those places that religion or society tell us ‘don’t explore,’” said Castillo.
Hayser considered that if “the sexual and sensual element is added to the curiosity about the forbidden, the recipe becomes very powerful.”
Indeed, both are protagonists of the great love affair of the series: Castillo, who plays Lucía, Alfredo’s wife, confesses his love for the tycoon’s younger brother, Bruno, Hayser’s character.
“It makes me a bit unfortunate because yes, they are very attractive topics (for the public), but that is not really attractive. Let’s tell stories that give more, beautiful messages, things that make you think,” said Karena Flores, who plays Mora, the daughter of Alfredo and Lucía.
Through fiction, however, the actors emphasized that they show the viewer the consequences of crossing the line of prohibition.
“It’s like you have a crystal ball to see what would happen if you made those decisions. (The series) has an apprenticeship, like stories,” Castillo asserted.
The characters, then, function as “a catalyst for emotions” and allow the audience “to do certain things that they would never do in their life,” Hayser continued.
“Those prohibitions, as actors, it is a delight to be able to interpret them, because all the time we are struggling to fall into that abyss,” insisted Flavio Medina, who plays the protagonist Alfredo.
The character of the hotel millionaire also contains other moral contradictions: ambition, gambling, manipulation.
“He is a guy who is in the place that he is professionally because he deserves it, but above all because he has known how to manipulate absolutely everything at his convenience to achieve what he wants, he uses power to advance,” said Medina.
His gambling addiction, added Flores, produces a series of events that degenerate “into total chaos.”
A REFLECTION OF INEQUALITY
In the first chapter of the series, recorded on the Spanish island of Tenerife, in the Canary Islands archipelago, the opulence of Arturo, his family and the people they rub shoulders with, contrasts with the precariousness of a couple of workers in the hotel complex, where they live and struggle to raise their baby.
This inequality, lamented Castillo, is common in Mexico, as in other parts of the world.
“(The series) invites us to say ‘that’s how we are, let’s see it.’ If we see it, we will be more aware of it, ”she said.
This latent inequality, Hayser added, allows us to reflect and “put the viewer in front of the mirror of what is being experienced in our daily lives.”
“What are we going to do with it? Are we going to continue allowing it or are we going to continue closing our eyes?” he questioned.
Within that image of inequality, Flavio settled, psychological violence between characters belonging to the highest social stratum is also framed.
“EXTREME SITUATIONS, EXTREME MEASURES”
When Alfredo is kidnapped under strange circumstances, the social structure of the island crumbles and triggers a series of situations in which the characters remove their masks.
“Disappearance is a straw that breaks the camel’s back, and from there you begin to realize the depth of all the characters,” explained Pablo Astiazarán, who plays the hotel security guard.
The investigation into the case, the cast agreed, is unconventional and outside the law.
“In extreme situations, extreme measures must be adopted. To unravel the mystery, you need to resort to unorthodox methods,” Hayser said.
