– Jesús Carroza, Natalia de Molina, Alberto Ammann and Alec Baldwin star in this film set in 1960s Casablanca, which blends family drama and political thriller
Actor-director Pedro Casablanc and actor Jesús Carroza on the set of The King’s Tailor
Principal photography has begun for The King’s Tailor, the directorial feature debut by actor Pedro Casablanc, who was nominated for a Goya Award for the movie B and was glimpsed recently in the series Querer, Rage and The Anatomy of a Moment. The film will be set in the Moroccan city of Casablanca during the 1960s, fusing the genres of family drama and political thriller.
With a screenplay penned by Fernando Navarro, the feature tells the story of Pablo (played by very young actor Mateo Casado), a boy growing in a tailor’s shop, whose innocent outlook on life will begin to crack at the seams when he discovers the secrets being concealed by the adults around him. Amidst scraps of fabric, hidden passages, illegal gambling and characters hailing from different parts of the world, the kid will be dragged into a world marked by mystery, film, adventure and the political tensions of the time.
The cast is toplined by Jesús Carroza (a Goya Award winner for 7 Virgins and recently appearing in Golpes) and Natalia de Molina (also a Goya winner for her turns in Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed and Food and Shelter, and recently in the series Superstar), Alberto Ammann (a Goya recipient for Cell 211), María Gandiaga, Joaquín Núñez, Farah Hamed, Nourdin Batán, Taha El Mahroug, Gonzalo de Castro, David Rodríguez, Candela Ortiz and Roberto Lezana; there will also be a special appearance by US thesp Alec Baldwin.
In the words of the first-time feature filmmaker (who previously helmed the short films Bubble, alongside Gabriel Olivares, and Sacrilegio), “This movie is born of my own personal memories linked to my childhood, to my father, and to the feeling of fascination I had as a child for film and the world of grown-ups. Even though it’s a fiction movie, it talks about how we idealise that world when we are small and how, little by little, we begin to discover all of its contradictions. I also wanted to pay tribute to all those Spanish families who had to rebuild their lives elsewhere during the Franco regime, in the cinematic, mysterious and fascinating environment that was 1960s Morocco.”
According to producer Álvaro Ariza, “Four years ago, I became extremely curious when reading an article by Pedro Casablanc in which he outlined how his passion for film stemmed from the connection that existed between his family’s tailor’s shop, where he lived with his relatives in Casablanca as a kid, and the projection booth of a movie theatre. When he told me more about it – the relationship with the projectionist, the parallels between a boy’s almost casual access to film in that period and in a Casablanca where people would wear colourful clothes, made of beautiful fabrics, while in Spain people wore black, and his experiences as a boy bearing witness to the political and social changes that were happening all around him – I just knew that this story had to be written by Fernando Navarro, be directed by Casablanc himself and be shown on the big screen.”
The King’s Tailor is being produced by Álvaro Ariza for Esto también pasará and María Luisa Gutiérrez Gómez for Bowfinger International Pictures, and co-produced by José Fernández de Vega for Glow Animation and Chris Hool for Mexico’s Studio 33, together with El Sastre del Rey AIE. It boasts the involvement of RTVE, Canal Sur, Movistar Plus+ and Netflix, in conjunction with Mogambo and Film Factory Entertainment, the sales agent that will be in charge of its international sales. It will hit Spanish screens courtesy of A Contracorriente Films.
(Translated from Spanish)
