Alejandro Sugich
Alejandro Sugich, producer, showrunner, and director of Los Hermanos Salvador, which premiered last Wednesday, March 23 on Disney+, explained that it is an innovative format, a comedy and fantasy series with high production values not usually done in the region. It has a very Mexican and Latin American humor, excellent writing, and endearing characters. “We like the fantasy in Latin America, but there are few regional productions that bet on it,” he said.
The series of ten 30-minute episodes features a cast made up of Francisco de la Reguera, Nacho Tahhan, Daniel Fuentes Lobo, Juan Ugarte, Adriana Hernández, Manuel Balbi, Mariana Gaja and Erick Velarde. It is the story of five brothers who have to reunite and bridge their differences to save the family legacy, which is magic and antique store. “The store is also a character because it has magic. And there is a family (Los Quiroga) that wants to take over the store. It is a fantasy comedy in which anything can happen. It doesn’t look like anything done by another country’s production. We are very happy that Disney believed and took a risk on this project,” he said.
This series produced in 2021 can be enjoyed by the whole family. “The biggest challenge was filming during the pandemic, with all the cost of the protocols, but in 14 weeks (six of pre-production and eight of production) any of the 90 people part of the crew got sick”. Post-production took six months, due to the complexity of working with special effects.
“This series is an example of how to invest money in special effects without going bankrupt,” said jokingly, who is also CEO and founder of Sula Films -producer of the series, in partnership with Gustavo Montaudon’s Alebrije Entertainment, and Javier Salgado, who distribute the series-. “A lot of green screens were used, a lot of effects and composites. It has time traveling, an apocalypse portal, a mutant goat, the summoning of a demon, a possession, each chapter has special effects and animation. It is filled with fantasy. It is a very white comedy, Chespirito style,” he said.
In addition, on post-production and special effects, they worked with other companies. “40% of the effects were done at Sula Films, led by Jorge Carvajal, who also directs an episode, and we hired two companies. The music was composed by Titán, from Argentina. Also Sumo Studio, Propulsion Image, Labo Digital and Binario VFX
participated in special effects.
Francisco de la Reguera, who acts and is a writer for the series, is another of its directors. “He was the one who introduced me to the project,” said Sugich, who added that Gilberto González, editor, also directs an episode. “What we did was create a multidisciplinary team, related to everything. There is a direct correlation with the project, which makes it very organic.”
