ROMANCE AND ART CAST A SPELL
El Sortilegio is a soap opera with a bonus. The telenovela -- its English title is "Love Spell" -- uses Mexican art as a backdrop for each episode. That's because the show's producer, Carla Estrada, invited artists from across the country to send in samples of their work. From 900 submissions, well-known Mexican artist José Luis Cuevas helped choose 200 pieces. These have become part of the setting for this hot, new TV series, which began broadcast June 1.
If you have ever tuned in to a Latin American telenovela, you know that these soap operas offer a crash course in conversational Spanish. With Sortilegio, you also get the exposure to contemporary Mexican art, plus a plot thick with intrigue and romance.
Wikipedia describes the telenovela as a melodrama in miniseries format. These shows air in prime time -- five or six nights a week for about six months. They usually end with a bang. They are the most-watched genre of television program in the world, with at least two billion viewers worldwide.
The News, an excellent English-language newspaper in Mexico City, recently published an article on Sortilegio and the tie-in with Mexican art. Here's an excerpt from http://www.thenews.com.mx/
"Sortilegio treads some well-worn but entertaining soap-opera turf. Antonio Lombardo, a successful businessman, becomes alienated by his wife's inability to conceive and henceforth falls in love with and impregnates his best friend Samuel's wife Victoria, who gives birth to twins.
"Samuel goes on raising the children as if they were his own, while later, Antonio's wife dies during childbirth and gives birth to a baby boy. Later, Samuel dies and Antonio and Victoria are able to live life together, with three children completely in the dark as to the true nature of their relationship.”
The children grow to adulthood, and that's when the plot really thickens. A quote from Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott comes to mind: "Oh, what a tangled we weave, when first we practice to deceive."
For a five-minue introduction to Sortilegio, take a look at the English-language trailer on the Web. Go to http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/Jacqueline-Bracamontes/video/x99zsl_sortilegio-trailer-english_shortfilms
The one-hour episodes, created by Televisa, air Monday through Friday at 9 p.m. on "canal de las estrellas" (channel of the stars) in most parts of Mexico. Check local time and channel for La Paz. Sortilegio has been in progress for a month, but with 95 episodes scheduled, there's time to catch up before the story reaches its dramatic conclusion in mid-October.
