2019 was a year of consolidation and recognition for the Galician production company Portocabo. After years of work, the company launched two productions that were positioned in the global content market: “Hierro” and “Dry Water”. "We currently have a double responsibility, a creation of quality content and to contribute to changing the co-production model thinking about different ties," said Alfonso Blanco, General Director of Portocabo to Señal News.
“Hierro” is a co-production of Portocabo, ARTE France and Atlantique Productions for Movistar+ that premiered very successfully in Spain and a second season has already been confirmed. The title was also very successful in France and Germany and Banijay Rights holds international distribution rights.
“Auga Seca” is a co-production of Portocabo and the Portuguese SPi for TVG and RTP and DCD Rights is the international distributor that sells the title. “It is true that we needed to co-produce because the world has changed. We have to create global products or we tend to disappear if we stay in our small market ”, asserted Blanco.
TWISTS OF CRIME DRAMA
Portocabo prints in each production its own look and with both "Hierro" and "Dry Water", they aim at a wide audience. "We are classics and our productions are aimed at a wide audiences, whether on platforms or on Free and Pay television," said the producer.
“In ‘Dry Water’ we work very solidly on the characters and try to stay close to reality, with credible, plausible, recognizable and permanent stories,” explained Blanco. The series is inspired by a real event of a robbery of a military arsenal in Portugal that generated much controversy in the country. “They stole many weapons, and their destiny was never known. What could happen with that arsenal is the question that ‘Dry Water’ tries to answer and the rest is fiction, "he completed. "The series combines the structure of a personal melodrama with a story close to reality and an attractive environment because we believe that the universe of the port of Vigo in Lisbon is visually very beautiful," he added.
For the Portuguese actress Victoria Guerra, who plays Teresa, the project was attractive from the beginning. “When I read the scripts I loved them immediately, they are very well written, they have a lot of tension, a lot of mystery, every time I finished a chapter, I wanted to read the next one and I thought that the audience could also feel the same,” she revealed. "Teresa is a brave, motorbike, very strong woman and I always play sweeter, more fragile characters, and I thought it was a unique opportunity and I appreciate the trust they placed in me," she said.
THE WAY TO TRAVEL
The international distributor DCD Rights was interested in “Dry Water” from the beginning. “We closed the agreement with them at the stage of development, in the writing of the scripts and it is something that rarely happens. They loved the content, and that already gave us a hunch,” Blanco said. “The impact that the series had on Mipcom was tremendous. It is very difficult to stand out in a market with so much volume of content and having been selected in the market was very positive."
“We've dreamed with be trend generators and producers of reliable content and we have achieved them, and the launch of 'Hierro' and the presentation of 'Auga Seca' in the same market were a conjunction, and today Portocabo became another company," he concluded.
By Romina Rodríguez