Gato Grande: It’s a great challenge to be at the forefront of physical production when important projects are involved

Carlos Taibo, the new director of Physical Production at Gato Grande, said that he faces an important challenge by joining for the first time a company that is in a growth sprint. “Especially now that they have gained momentum after the success of Luis Miguel, the series, and with a list of important projects. I am very happy,” he said. He will be in charge of the operational part, that is, he will be assuming the projects once they are developed, financed, and approved.

One of the main problems (“a happy problem”, he says) is the volume of production in Mexico, which makes it difficult to get hold of the professionals and technicians that are required. He assures that the industry – production companies, schools, universities, companies, government – must focus on training the talent that will be increasingly necessary. Taibo knows what he’s talking about because for more than twenty years he has been teaching at the National School of Cinematographic Arts of the UNAM. Very recently they organized a 10-week workshop between the ENAC and Canacine, on online production. “It is one of the most important points to develop,” he said.

The situation of a lot of audiovisual production is already an important path of training, which needs to speed up the pace.

Taibo has been a 7-year professor at the Cinematographic Training Center, 20 years at the ENAC, and also 7-years at the San Antonio de Los Baños Film School, in Cuba. He is also the author, together with Martha Orozco, of the Basic Manual of Cinematographic Production, a reference text in most film and television schools. “It is a book made from a team thinking point of view, to facilitate the work of new generations, and we have already sold 6,500 copies. It was edited between the CCC and the ENAC and it has been very successful” he said.

Regarding how production has changed, he said that the most important thing has been the adaptation of filmmakers’ teams, the production of series. “Cinema is slow-paced, you can spend more time on it. But the series has a different rhythm. Going from making movies to series can be breathtaking because quality must prevail despite less time’ he said. Also, it is facing a larger creative body, which involves platforms that also participate. “You have to think about the series from another angle. Working with several directors also makes us more flexible and capable of building from another narrative. The figure of the showrunner is incorporated a director, or directors, who is also a screenwriter. In this complex world, the most important thing is to maintain teamwork.”

“ZeroZeroZero, with Redrum, who did the production services for Cattleya, was a complex production because the action needs a different approach,” he said, in addition to the work he did with Woo Films and Manolo Caro for the seasons 1,2 and 3 of La Casa de las Flores, and Alguien Tiene Que Morir. He also worked on Rebelde, season 1, Érase una vez, pero ya no, all for Netflix. In addition, Todo Mal and La boda de Valentina, with Marco Polo Constandse from Filmadora.

Taibo has more than 30 years of experience, he started very young, when his father had a television program. He worked with Carmen Armendariz, where he began to be passionate about production. He comes from a family of well-known writers, journalists, and intellectuals, but he prefers to keep a low profile