Telemundo hopes using HD cameras on novela is enough to get 'La Reyna del Sur' an Emmy
By ONANTZIN News
2011-06-24
Los Angeles, CA -- Spanish-language TV has never won a Primetime Emmy in any of the major categories, but not because of a lack of effort on the part of the Spanish-language networks.
Year after year, dating back to the 1970s, they have reached for that coveted Emmy award with their highly addictive novelas, but, year after year, they have been turned away and told that their shows lack a certain something: variety, creativity, uniqueness, and character development(a nice way of telling them they need better actors).
Motivated by their past failures, and provoked by the criticisms that their shows are all just the same novela altered in some small way, executives at the largest Spanish-language network, Telemundo, worked tirelessly over the past two decades to improve their lineup in the hope of getting the recognition they deserve from the Emmy academy.
Now, bearing the fruit of their hard work, executives at Telemundo think they have finally put together an original, wildly creative, and breathtaking new show in "La Reyna del Sur" – a highly popular TV show, which they claim is much more than just another tired old novela with recycled actors.
"They wanted diversity, creativity, plus originality, so we gave it to them. This novela is being recorded with not just two, but an impressive three HD cameras - something we've never done before! and we do this thing where we zoom in and out of scenes that is just amazing, not to mention how we pan left and right to get an incredibly creative effect", said Joshua Mintz, Telemundo's vice president of entertainment.
Based on a true story, "La Reyna del Sur" chronicles the life of a naive Mexican woman who falls in love with a drug lord and stumbles into becoming one of the world's most powerful drug traffickers.
"The HD cameras that we use are enough, in my opinion, but we also do wild things like put a camera on a roof to shoot certain scenes, we do multiple shots per scene, and we tried to put a camera on a helicopter but it didn't work – I still give ourselves points for effort though. This is cutting edge stuff that no other novela is doing. We are so original it makes me proud to say it. I don't see how the Emmy academy can turn us away this time for being unoriginal", added Mintz.
But while Telemundo certainly has high hopes of their new production, the reality is that it's a long shot for the network. 'La Reyna del Sur' played well with Spanish-speaking audiences and even had some crossover appeal due to all the white boys that Latinas have married and turned into noveleros, but the bulk of the voters in the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences said that although they don't speak Spanish, this new "original" show looks like every other novela, just in HD.
Nominations for this year's Primetime Emmys close Friday, and Telemundo remains confident that this will be their year. "It's now or never" said Mintz. "If we don't win, I have no idea how else we can make our shows more creative and original".