The residents of Plaza de los Frutos have made history. With more than 4,400 episodes broadcast adding its two stages, Love is forever (from 2005 to 2012, called Loving in troubled times and broadcast on La 1; As of 2013 it was Love is forever on Antena 3) is the Spanish fiction production with the most episodes in history. Its plot, which developed between 1936 and 1982, has followed the political and social changes in Spain through several families. The series says goodbye as the leader of its time slot (in 2024, it will reach 1.2 million viewers on average, with an 11.8% share). Today, Wednesday, he says goodbye on Antena 3 with an episode in prime time (10:50 p.m.). Its place on the after-dinner tables will be occupied by another series, Dreams of liberty.
More than 1,600 actors have passed through Amar, which has shot 41,300 sequences on 300 sets. Only three interpreters have remained in the fiction from chapter 1 to the last. Marcelino, Manolita and Pelayo, the family that runs the iconic El Asturiano bar, are Manu Baqueiro, Itziar Miranda and José Antonio Sayagués, who answer our questions by phone. The latter assures that, since filming finished in October, he misses waking up at five in the morning. life after Amar is treating them well: Itziar Miranda already has several film projects and will present a program on Aragón TV, It had to be from here, and Manu Baqueiro continues touring in theaters and will be in the series What are you waiting for?, also for Antena 3.
Ask. Do you remember your first day in Amar?
Itziar Miranda. Perfectly, because tonight we are going to see something very beautiful and very generous on the part of the two networks that have accompanied us, the first sequence of Amar, and he went with Manu. The director was Eduardo Casanova, who is now the director of the series. He is from Zaragoza, so am I, and I felt very accompanied, very cared for… We were two children wanting to build these characters and I remember thinking a lot about my grandmother, what she was like, her gestures…
Manu Baqueiro I was on edge. Before there was another Marcelino, about 10 chapters had been recorded but I was not convinced and they called me to get on the bandwagon from one day to the next. I had a sequence in the bar with Pelayo, and he told me, “you’re going to be my son,” and I told him, “and you’re going to be my father.” I remember thinking, he’s starting to create this character because you’re against the clock and there’s no room. I connected immediately with José Antonio and the team, they gave me a lot of space. A director told me: “He is a glass-half-full guy. From there, we are in your hands because we are against the clock.” I think I ended it on a good note seeing how far we’ve come.
José Antonio Sayagués. It was episode 0. I did it and the next day it had to be repeated because the actor changed, and that’s when Manu Baqueiro appeared. I thought, “wow, I must have done it really badly because I have to do it again.” Then they gave me a package of sequences and I shouldn’t have done so badly because it was a big package. It was a very important moment as an actor, as if he had opened a door. I had that intuition. When he went from Salamanca to Madrid to do castings and they didn’t catch me, and again and again, I always had the intuition that at some point, after hitting the horseshoe so many times, I would hit the nail on the head once, and that’s how it happened.
P. How was the recording of your last sequence?
I. M. It was absolutely exciting. I say the last phrase of the series, and I wasn’t able to remember it, it was incredible. I have never failed with the text, I have a long memory. But he couldn’t remember the last sentence. When we got to that moment, that at any moment they could say, “cut, it’s been good, so far Love is forever“…, look, I get excited telling you about it. He wasn’t capable. We had to go back to it several times until I finally said it.
M. B. Emotion, tears… I had many flashbacks of moments lived. It was a sequence that took me to past moments, with the whole family reunion… I wanted to fight that emotion to be centered and for the emotional wildness to come later, but it was difficult. I remember it as a catharsis, all the emotions came out, and although it took longer to shoot it, it was an ending full of affection and love. They are three characters full of love, and that has reached the end, the last sequence and the last shot.
J. A. S. It was a very hard sequence, very difficult to do from an interpretive point of view because it was very imbued with emotion. It was with Manu Baqueiro, who for me is like he was my son, and it was very hard to play him without getting carried away by the emotional current. I think in our sequence we skipped the script, we went to the idea, it went beyond the lyrics.
P. If you had to choose a moment in your character’s journey over these 19 years, what would it be?
I. M. I think there was a before and after with Marisol’s death. For such a beloved character to have his daughter die due to a drug problem in Madrid in the eighties was very brutal. I remember that year there was a moment when I felt very sad at home and it was because I was carrying things about the character, but it was hard to go through those emotions.
M. B. So many things have happened… But I would say that he has learned a lot from the women in his family, from Manolita, from Luisita… They have been changing his way of thinking, and accepting many things that a man of that time would have a hard time accepting. He has grown a lot through the female figures in his family.
J. A. S. The arc is very large and with many emotional relationships, all the codes, from comedy, tragicomedy, melodrama… A whole kaleidoscope of sensations and ways of doing things. I would stay with that worldview that sailing in those wonderful waters has represented for me.
P. Because Amar Has it managed to last 19 years on the air? What does it have that has made it different?
I. M. First, the best audience that any fiction could dream of, absolutely faithful. We have told the story of Spain paying tribute to our parents, our grandparents, to that generation that lived through the Transition, and we have told it with a lot of truth, a lot of tenderness and a lot of love, and also a lot of pain and humor.
M. B. The scriptwriters and directors knew how to see a very good possibility in preserving some characters that had established themselves and came undercover and, in order not to tire them out, to renew the rest. And then a very good point that we did have to see was, when we focused on these characters, giving them a point of comedy and freshness in those first years, because the other plots were very intense.
J. A. S. It has had a very important governing head, Eduardo Casanova [director de la serie]a magnificent captain in command, and an extraordinary team with a great advantage, that we were all in the same boat, rowing in the same direction.
P. What have you learned from your character?
I. M. His courage, his strength, his sense of humor, his sensitivity… He has experienced many things before me, in some way he has taught me. She has been a mother before me, she has been married before me, she has suffered loss before me. We must thank the scriptwriters for this, they are the creators, and with Manolita they have written a gem of a character.
M. B. So many things… His kindness, his love, his humility, his part of Peter Pan, wanting to be surprised by everything, playing like a child with everything… But above all, his generosity, he is very dedicated to others.
J. A. S. Pelayo is a multifaceted character, he has many edges. It is based on very deep philosophical foundations such as the Stoic ones, it has a lot to do with Don Quixote, Sancho, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Nietzsche, Heraclitus, the classics… All of this has changed my life from a spiritual point of view. I am no longer the same as when I started, my self, fortunately, is a different thing.
P. Have you taken any physical souvenirs from the series or the character?
I. M. Manolita’s glasses, the skirts, which were custom made, and various Manolita things.
M. B. The family album with a thousand photos from all the years, which I look at at home and a little tear falls when I remember the seasons, so many people, our evolution. I took an Atleti scarf, and I’m from Madrid, but that embroidered scarf, with Marcelino being a mattress fan, I had to take. I have an Asturian menu and something else.
J. A. S. The glasses, which are emblematic of Pelayo. They are close-up glasses, prescription glasses for me.