Upcoming King Juan Carlos Drama series

[WreathOfLaurels]

4th July - The creators of The Ministry of Time and Isabel have announced what they are calling Spain’s answer to Netflix’s The Crown. Javier Olivaries is adapting Pilar Eyre’s 2020 Yo El Rey in to a 3 season show that will chart the rise and fall of the king and the Spanish crowns relationship to a changing Spain.

More information from El Pais:

https://elpais-com.cdn.ampproject.o...orno-al-rey-juan-carlos-i.html?outputType=amp

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

Oh dear this is going to be crazy, as in The Crown you can imagine a script because its a drama series but it will stick with people as reality.
They need to find a tall actor for Felipe!

 

[Blog Real]

I don't know if this is a good idea.
Anyway, these series are always very fictional and have little real.

Other news on this subject:
https://www.lanacion.com.ar/especta...ey-juan-carlos-como-protagonista-nid05072021/

 

[Curryong]

And how are they going to portray King Juan Carlos or his relationship with Queen Sofia?

 

[Prinsara]

All I saw on the sidebar was "Upcoming Juan Carlos Drama" and I thought "what's going to happen now"?

"Upcoming Fictional Juan Carlos Drama" would be the clarification, I guess.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

I think you can already say about reality, 'you couldn't make it up'!

 

[Moran]

I'd like to know about Juan Carlos and Sofia's relationship as well. It's a delicate issue to portray...

 

[Prinsara]

It's a marriage breaking down. Is it truly that difficult?

I wonder if they'll go back to Alfonsito. That's even harder ground to tread.

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

Judging from what the producers have said it sounds like this will focus on 1975 onwards, with an emphasis on the king’s personal relationships and royal finance along with the politics of the media. There has already been a series focusing on JCs early life which covered what happened to Infante Alfonso in some detail. That show was based on Paul Preston’s bio and was criticised for glossing over the scandals and problems.

The fact they have said they want to use his relationships with the women in his life as the main narrative motor sounds interesting , as does the claim that Sofia’s portrayal will avoid the excessive praise that has become common in recent years towards her.

And given what actually has transpired for Juan Carlos IRL, and the Spanish royal family more broadly, well, maybe he should take a look in the mirror if he’s got a problem with how he’s being portrayed.

 

[Prinsara]

Were they ever happy?

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

Were they ever happy?

Depends on how you define happiness i guess and they probably have a different benchmark for marital satisfaction compared to us. I would be sceptical about what they (esp JC) say now - a lot of it strikes me as post hoc revisionism and self justification.

Still, curious how the show will portray it, even if the choice of soiurce material makes me nervous.

 

[Alison H]

I'm really not keen on dramas about people who are still alive, unless they're made with the person's co-operation. Even dramas about people who are no longer alive but whose immediate relatives are still alive have been known to cause a lot of upset.

 

[Prinsara]

Still, curious how the show will portray it, even if the choice of soiurce material makes me nervous.

What else are they meant to use, other than real life?

 

[Alison H]

As with anything, there are ways of presenting what happened to make someone look good and someone else look bad. And, when something's presented as a historical drama, people tend to assume that it's fact - thanks to Philippa Gregory, a lot of people have got all sorts of inaccurate ideas about the Yorkists and the Tudors, and then there's The Crown. The idea of picking over the details of a marriage when both partners are still alive just seems quite unpleasant to me.

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

What else are they meant to use, other than real life?

The main source is Pilar Eyre’s book Yo El Rey - Eyre isn’t very reliable and she is something of a scandalmonger if not a conspiracy theorist.

 

[Prinsara]

I see, but there doesn't seem to be an alternate biography the director found interesting. Is there something else that would work better?

I agree this is unfortunate for Sofia and Felipe and the girls. With the embarrassment, it's almost like another scandal.

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

I see, but there doesn't seem to be an alternate biography the director found interesting. Is there something else that would work better?

I agree this is unfortunate for Sofia and Felipe and the girls. With the embarrassment, it's almost like another scandal.

The others are far too deferential and don’t go into detail about the sex and sleaze ie what gets ratings. In theory I’m actually pleased as too many of the media portraits of JC have been too reverential and we’re long overdue a revisionist corrective, but my gut tells me this is going to be hatchet job territory. Given the political climate, sympathetic portrayals probably won’t wash with the public anymore and there’s an appetite for more critical appraisal as far as I can tell.

At best this could be a great “how we got into this situation” type show.

 

[Blog Real]

A series of 22 chapters will recreate the history of the Spanish monarchy between the years 1900 and 2014. With a script by the journalist Sergio Vila-Sanjuán, the series "Palacio Real", "dramatizes the biographical and historical circumstances carried out since 1900 by Alfonso XIII , Don Juan de Borbón and Juan Carlos I, until his son Felipe VI's abdication", as the Diagonal TV production company announced this Wednesday.

https://www.lavanguardia.com/series...al-espana-borbon-palacio-real-rey-borbon.html

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

A series of 22 chapters will recreate the history of the Spanish monarchy between the years 1900 and 2014. With a script by the journalist Sergio Vila-Sanjuán, the series "Palacio Real", "dramatizes the biographical and historical circumstances carried out since 1900 by Alfonso XIII , Don Juan de Borbón and Juan Carlos I, until his son Felipe VI's abdication", as the Diagonal TV production company announced this Wednesday.

https://www.lavanguardia.com/series...al-espana-borbon-palacio-real-rey-borbon.html

So this looks like a rival project - ok could be fun to watch these back to back

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

The news has reached the English language media

https://variety.com/2021/tv/global/the-mediapro-studio-el-rey-olivares-1235012516/

 

[MonarchistGropyer]

this going to be a leftist republican propaganda?

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

this going to be a leftist republican propaganda?

Compared to The Crown, maybe? My personal concern is that unlike Peter Morgan, who is at least interested in what makes the Windsors tick, and tries to understand them on their terms - even if those terms aren’t flattering to the general public; Javier Olivares just wants to put the knife in with no motivation or context.

My main concern is that this will be devoid of empathy and understanding for JC himself (I’ve been very critical of him elsewhere but I don’t believe he started out bad per se nor was he alone in is poor life choices) and the RF more broadly. This kind of understanding of motivation and moral seriousness is part of what makes The Crown so compelling for me (I know that others in the forum will disagree). The fact he has cited a writer known for harsh Satire as an influence makes me thing this will be an exercise in tearing JC down rather than getting inside his head.

It’s early days and the producers might surprise us - the Isabel series was much better than many expected it to be, so who knows?

The other issues - budget for sets and costumes and cgi for certain things- that’s also a bit concerning but The Crown gets a budget of $13 million an episode so there’s no way MediaPro can match that level of production design and that can ruin the experience if the creators can’t get creative to get around it.

 

[WreathOfLaurels]

Seems that XRey will be a “multilingual” series and will have the same production team as Homeland

https://deadline.com/2021/10/homela...ersial-spanish-king-juan-carlos-i-1234851450/