Andrés Vicente Gómez, movie producer: “Where there is a failure, let it take away a success. Success stuns” | Culture | EUROtoday

Andrés Vicente Gómez (Leganés, Madrid, 82 years outdated) is transferring. He tells it from the terrace of the home overlooking Madrid’s El Retiro park the place he has lived for a few years, when he met his final spouse, the journalist Concha García Campoy. An issue along with his macula prevents him from recognizing the park as it’s, one thing that causes him immense ache. Your lounge is the amusement park for anybody curious. Goya Awards, books, distinctive pictures and a espresso with milk and pastries. For years his skilled ties have been extra current in Saudi Arabia than in Spain, however this winter afternoon he needs to speak about his profession and a handful of people that have gone by it. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what I wanted to tell you,” he says with the primary sip of espresso.

Ask. You will say.

Answer. I imagine that my life is conditioned and divided by three ladies, who’re those who’ve marked my skilled durations in a really clear method. I separated from my first spouse, the Finnish lady, in 1975, simply with Franco’s dying. I do not forget that I awoke on the evening of November 20 with Carmen [Rico Godoy, su segunda mujer] At the Cuzco lodge, we turned on the radio and listened to sacred music.

P. What a begin to tomorrow.

R. We have been underneath the shock about one thing that had occurred to us the evening earlier than, as a result of the newspaper had despatched her to cowl the information of Franco’s dying on the Peace Hospital whereas the dictator was dying. At that point I used to be making a movie with Rocío Jurado and Carmen referred to as me at eight within the afternoon and informed me: “Franco has died. It hasn’t been said yet, but oh well.” And as quickly as he hung up, as I knew meapilas which was the Jurado household, I referred to as Rocío and informed her: “Franco has died.” The subsequent day he needed to kill me as a result of they spent the entire evening praying a novena. The mom, the brother, everybody… thank goodness he actually died.

P. Rico Godoy was his second stage, I sense.

R. Yes, I used to be along with her for 23, 24 years. And though with Concha [García Campoy] lived solely 13, it’s curious as a result of for formal and even skilled functions I embrace it in one other 25 years, maybe due to the affect it might have had on my private {and professional} life. The skilled relations that I now have with Saudi Arabia have been cemented there, they even prompt taking me to Concha to remedy her leukemia as a result of they’d the perfect hospitals. I informed them: “You will have the best hospitals, but not the best doctors.” My life is these three phases, with these three ladies or as I say, my three administrations.

P. “Star producer of Spanish cinema.” They outline it like this.

R. And that, of all of the specialties inside cinema, probably the most unknown is that of the producer.

P. Because?

R. Because nobody has been sufficient, as a result of the producers themselves haven’t been capable of clarify it, or perhaps it’s as a result of it’s sophisticated. The confusion begins with a silly reality, one thing easy. There is the time period producer and there’s the time period producer. The first is a pure individual and the second is a authorized individual. The first creates the movies, invents them, and the second is the corporate that legally holds the rights, improvement, contracts, funds, requests credit, and so on.

P. He does not like being requested in regards to the movie he likes probably the most of all those he is made…

R. People count on me to say Good instancesand when you ask me which one I’ve felt probably the most emotion with, I’m positive it is that one, as a result of if if you flip round on stage after amassing the Oscar you see Bruce Springsteen, and Paul Newman is with you within the elevator…

P. Life isn’t the identical from that second on.

R. Probably the movie that has modified my life probably the most is The gold. Everything occurred to us, we had the Nicaraguan counter, three or 4 sharks ate a number of of the workforce… you’ll be able to’t think about. And my sister-in-law Mercedes was then ambassador in Costa Rica they usually helped me quite a bit. We needed to lower timber to get the wooden, dry it, construct a form of boat of the time… it was a really exhausting movie that we ready for a yr and a half and never within the workplaces, however within the jungle. The filming lasted so lengthy… it was the most costly movie on the time, we’re speaking six million euros in 1983, though now that is shit, and the headlines damage us quite a bit. We took the Kings to the premiere, we had the cocktail occasion on the Royal Palace, we arrange a pink carpet that went from the movie show to the palace… It isn’t the perfect movie nor probably the most dangerous, but it surely is filled with components which might be tough to overlook, which is why it’s tough to call one.

P. Your successes are talked about quite a bit, what have you ever realized from failure?

R. Where there’s a failure, let successful be eliminated. Success stuns.

P. And what does failure do?

R. It teaches you. It’s like unrequited love, there’s nothing extra thrilling. But making films is rather more diversified. It’s not that I’ve made 147 movies, it is that I’ve created 147 corporations, each utterly totally different from the opposite.

P. He could have answered it a thousand instances, however I can not resist asking him about subsidies for Spanish cinema.

R. It is a subject that bothers me quite a bit, as a result of I’m satisfied that subsidies aren’t a present, and but, you’re feeling obliged to elucidate it. I feel that the totally different governments haven’t defined the thought properly, particularly the overall administrators, who’ve been very poorly appointed. If I’ve to overview from the primary, which was glorious, Pilar Miró, to the final, twenty-five have handed, and I could not title greater than three who actually knew in regards to the movie business and who have been able to managing that sector that had fallen to their lot. They’ve performed one thing loopy! But they’ve even named film buffs, even worse issues!

P. I do not know if at this level in his profession there’s anybody who has left an impression on him or silenced him.

R. I feel that the individual I’ve had probably the most intimacy with has been [Orson] Welles. He was very talkative, and likewise talkative in regards to the issues of the day, he nearly at all times mentioned issues seen from an angle that maybe you had not seen. Then he had many defects, he drank quite a bit and that made him out of his orbit many instances, he was not as knowledgeable as he thought… it’s tough to say him as an exemplary individual. I additionally keep in mind after I began working with Fernando Trueba. He had me in awe, no matter he prompt I did. If I hadn’t admired folks I would not have been capable of work with them.