It is shortly after 7pm, and my sister-in-law Maritsa is absent-mindedly scraping a sweet potato in the kitchen of our home in Havana. She glances at the clock on the wall and shrieks: “Ay, la novela!” Other female members of the household also consult timepieces and there follows a stampede through the narrow passageway that leads to the living-room: pots, pans, a dog and two small children are sent flying in the rush for the best seats in front of the TV and the latest episode of
Al Compas del Son, a soap opera set in 1930s Cuba.
This obsessive behaviour occurs throughout South America and the Latin Caribbean, where the telenovela format is the staple of television and more than 80 million people sit glued to their favourites every night. If Channel 4 has backed a winner (and all the evidence so far suggests that it has), then it is about to be repeated here.
Tomorrow, British viewers will have their first sight of Ugly Betty, the drama that has attracted audiences of up to 16 million in the US since it began in September, has already been nominated for two Golden Globes and has been described as the surprise hit of the season there. It’s a surprise only if you look at the TV business through blinkers. Ugly Betty is the US version of the telenovela Yo Soy Betty La Fea, first made and broadcast in Colombia from 1999 to 2001, when the final episode brought the country to a standstill. It has been a TV phenomenon ever since, dubbed and shown in more than 20 countries, including Romania, Japan, Turkey and China. The only surprise is that it has taken this long to make an English-language version.
Ugly Betty tells the story of Betty Suarez, a girl best described as homely, who lands a job as an assistant at a glamorous fashion magazine. At first sight, her superficial ugliness appears to break the first rule of the telenovela — that all the women are impossibly beautiful: but behind Betty’s spectacles and teeth braces she is, of course, a stunner — so that’s all right, then.
The second rule is that there are no further rules: anything, however improbable, can happen, and usually does. Unlike British TV soaps — which are open-ended, with changing characters, plots and storylines to retain viewer interest, and finish only when the ratings say so — the telenovela has a distinct beginning, middle and end.
The standard themes are love, betrayal, jealousy, seduction, violence, revenge, oppression, passion and corruption. There are not a lot of laughs. In the first episode you are introduced to the principal characters. These will include a poor but beautiful young woman, and a rich and handsome young man. The latter will dump his equally rich but evil and devious girlfriend for the former, with whom he falls in love because, though skint, she has a caring heart and a beautiful soul. In this he will be opposed by his family, usually led by a black-clad, manipulative, widowed matriarch and including at least one vicious and homicidal sibling. For leavening, the family usually includes one powerful and benevolent member, possibly an uncle, who pulls strings behind the scenes to facilitate the young couple’s happiness.
In the final episode, all the villains meet spectacularly violent, gruesome, bloody and painful ends, and the young couple begin a happy married life in a hacienda full of sunshine, flowers and children. Often it turns out that the heroine isn’t poor at all, but was stolen at birth from a wealthy family who have been seeking her for 25 years and turn up in the last five minutes with suitcases of money.
In the middle — and the middle can be anything up to 200 one-hour episodes — there is every plot twist you could imagine, and many that you couldn’t. Some are planned by the writers, some are forced upon them. For instance, in December 1992, midway through the run of the Brazilian telenovela De Corpo e Alma, the 22-year-old actress Daniella Pérez was stabbed to death by her co-star and his wife. The screenwriter, Gloria Pérez (Daniella’s mother — I did say anything could happen) hurriedly inserted a storyline about the inadequacy of the Brazilian criminal justice system. The murderous couple were arrested, tried, convicted and jailed — and Brazilian murder law was changed.
Other confusions are less bloody. For weeks I was hooked on the Mexican telenovela Prisionera (for plot, see above, but add a secret daughter), with Mauricio Islas playing the hero, Daniel Moncada. Then, bizarrely, Daniel just disappeared. There was a chap that the other characters referred to as Daniel, doing all the things that Daniel did, but it wasn’t Daniel.
It emerged later that Islas had been accused of not entirely appropriate behaviour with his 16-year-old co-star, Genesis Rodriguez. He denied it, but was summarily fired anyway and replaced with another actor. Well, they might have told me. Disconcerting? Imagine if Peggy Mitchell in the Queen Vic was played by Barbara Windsor on the Friday and Beverley Callard the following Monday, with no announcement from the EastEnders producers that anything had changed, and you get the idea.
The source material for telenovelas varies. Some are original — Yo Soy Betty La Fea was written from scratch by Fernando Gaitan — while others draw on more familiar inspirations. For instance, the tele- novela in which Mauricio Islas resurfaced was called Los Plateados. He played a wealthy Mexican landowner who is robbed of his fortune and property, retreats to a cave in the hills and leads a band of benevolent outlaws. I watched it for weeks with the nagging feeling that the story was somehow familiar.
Then it hit me: it was Robin Hood, complete with Maid Marian (they marry in the end, natch), Sheriff of Nottingham, Friar Tuck, the lot.
If you think all this sounds like brain-dead television that doesn’t stand a chance with sophisticated British audiences, then TV executives here are betting that you’re wrong. Ugly Betty is the first, but there will be more. The BBC has commissioned the playwright Jonathan Harvey to work on a telenovela project with Talkback Thames, makers of The Bill. Other production companies will be watching closely, so expect a flood in the next couple of years.
But if you want to see the originals in all their glorious improbability, you really need to brush up on your Spanish.
TELENOVELA MANIA: THE TOP FIVE
Los Ricos También Lloran, Mexico, 1979, about a homeless girl adopted by a millionaire. The first global telenovela, dubbed and exported worldwide, with 100 million viewers in the Soviet Union. During fighting between Georgia and Abkhazia, Pravda reported that troops agreed a ceasefire while it was on.
Escrava Isaura, Brazil, 1976, about a white slave girl who fights off an evil plantation landlord and a humpbacked dwarf before finding true love. World’s most-watched telenovela, inexplicably popular in China, where it had 500 million viewers. In Hungary, viewers collected the equivalent of $75,000 and sent it to the Brazilian embassy to buy the heroine’s freedom.
Simplemente María, Peru, 1969-1971, remade in Venezuela, 1989. For the final episode, when the heroine married her lover Esteban, a crowd of 10,000 gathered outside a church in Lima carrying gifts for the couple. Women cried and several fainted when the bride said “yes”.
Sin Tetas No Hay Paraíso, Colombia, 2006, based on the bestselling novel by Gustavo Bolívar Moreno about a young girl who decides that only breast implants can raise her out of poverty. The final episode last October won more than seven million viewers, a Colombian record.
Amor Real, Mexico, 2003, the story of a woman torn between her husband and her lover. With two genuine heroes, more sophisticated than usual. First telenovela to be released on DVD with English subtitles, glossy, high production values, as big a hit in the US as it was in Mexico.
Ugly Betty, C4, tomorrow, 9.30pm
