The creators of 'La que se avecina' go over to Netflix with 'Alpha Males', a series about the new masculinities

They are responsible for some of the most successful Spanish television comedies of the last two decades.

After years struggling in the open channels, the brothers Laura and Alberto Caballero, creators of

and

will launch their next project on Netflix.

The comedy

, produced by Contuberniofilms, will have a first season of 10 episodes of 30 minutes each.

Its plot will explore the new masculinities and how four friends in their forties face the loss of the privileges that their condition as men used to bring them and the changes brought about by a society where equality is imposed.

The origin of this series dates back to the early days of the pandemic.

After the strictest confinement, they managed to finish off the recordings of

but they still could not shoot

due to the difficulties caused by travel between autonomous communities.

They took advantage of that break to develop new series.

One of those projects was brought by the screenwriter Araceli Álvarez de Sotomayor and was starring women in their 40s.

“We thought that a time had come when, perhaps, there was a saturation, albeit wonderful, of girl series, with feminine visions and very well told.

We considered what we could contribute and we believed that the roadmap for feminism and women is clear, but that of men is not, ”says Alberto Caballero in a meeting room in the offices that Netflix has on Paseo de la Castellana in Madrid.

“We began to investigate the new masculinity and we thought it could be interesting to see how men are reacting to these changes,

what it means to be a man adapted to the times.

What happens if some characters raised within a patriarchal social structure and a macho culture, a bridging generation like ours, face those changes that are quite beasts?

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To do this, the screenwriters, two men (Alberto Caballero and Daniel Deorador) and two women (Laura Caballero and Araceli Álvarez de Sotomayor), a parity consciously sought to maintain balance in the point of view, have constructed characters with different degrees of sensitivity to social transformation.

"We have thrown them to suffer in their flesh these changes of power in general, economic, sexual... and how all that has to redefine them," explains the screenwriter and producer.

Alongside the male characters will be the women, the ones who will really move the story forward and force the changes.

We avoid being a profeminist pamphlet or a vindication of the classic machirulo

Although at first they considered turning this idea into a movie, they ended up discarding it.

“The series is something contemporary about something that is happening, it does not try to position itself but to tell, in a realistic comedy tone, what we are all experiencing.

We avoid being a profeminist pamphlet or being a vindication of the classic

”, add the scriptwriters.

With two decades of experience in free-to-air television and a strong relationship in recent years with Mediaset, the move by the Caballero brothers to Netflix may be surprising.

“At the time, the platform conveyed to us its desire to work together.

This historically had not been possible due to the type of agreement we had with Mediaset.

But that agreement has been normalized and now allows us to work with other platforms.

Netflix had just incorporated

to their sample book and they did very well, that, in part, has helped”, explains Alberto Caballero.

When they were presented with options with the ideas they had, they did not hesitate to choose this story.

For the writers and producers, this adventure means stepping out of their comfort zone.

“When you have been in the industry for a long time, you need to find your springs so as not to accommodate yourself and devalue yourself, finding something else gives you life”, reflects the screenwriter.

The scriptwriters and producers Laura and Alberto Caballero.

JOHN BARBOSA

Ask.

How are you going to take all this in Mediaset?

Albert Knight.

Very well, because they want us to be happy.

Right now we can have the luxury of being on Netflix because Mediaset agreed at the time.

It's been many years, many years of success, an almost personal relationship of friendship with Paolo [Vasile, CEO of Mediaset España], we have been able to produce thanks to Mediaset, who backed us at the time, and the relationship with them has been wonderful .

This does not mean that it is one thing or the other, we just wanted to make the leap to another experience, another language, and we wanted to do it with the best.

I think they will be happy because conventional television is aware of the paradigm shift that fundamentally affects fiction.

There are stories and formats whose natural space is a platform, not a conventional TV.

Q.

Do you already know?

AC

We are very discreet with our relationships and very careful with information.

But if they don't know it, they imagine it.

It is a natural space and, somehow, they understand each other very well.

is on Netflix and

on Amazon.

Traditional television stations are becoming studios and, at the same time, in all the fiction part they have been able to reach a symbiosis and an understanding with the platforms and nobody loses out.

And we win, of course, and the whole industry.

The more series are made, the more we will all win.

The more we practice, the better we will be.

This news comes just as the Caballeros are in the middle of moving

the series had to leave the sets where it was filmed and has now moved to a new "work center", where they moved the content of the 25 trailers with accumulated material from these years.

Since January, they have been building the sets that will host the filming of the 13th, 14th and 15th seasons, already confirmed by Mediaset.

They also have another installment of

"Everything comes together, but there are things you can't say no to, the job sometimes comes suddenly," they say.

30 minute episodes

Another novelty for the Caballero brothers will be the 30-minute comedy format after years with episodes that exceeded 70 or 80 minutes.

“When writing is more fluid and less complex than making such choral and long series”, says Alberto.

"Many chapters of

or

seem to be two in one, there is a point where you could divide them," adds Laura Caballero.

“Actually it was the format in which we would have liked to write everything we wrote, the rhythm is not so different from what we have been doing in

at one end or

at the other.

In that balance between a very crazy urban series and the rhythm of empty Spain,

”, completes Albert.

An image of 'The one that is coming'.

At the Netflix office, the Caballeros are greeted like rock stars.

They assure that, although they have not yet started shooting and have only been with them for a short time, they have already found differences in how they work for free-to-air networks and for a platform like Netflix.

“First, you notice a change in that your recipient is different.

When they call us, they do it with the aim of doing something that many people see, we are fully aware of that, but the objective of whoever hires you changes.

They value a project based on the effect it may have, rather than because it has a very broad target audience”, explains Alberto Caballero.

They also talk about changes in the freedom they are given, although they assure that they have never had problems in this regard with open channels.

"And you notice the involvement of many more people in the origin of the project," says Alberto.

“And with great enthusiasm, that has delighted me.

In other places everything is more neutral”, adds Laura.

But, above all, they will live more calmly, without being aware of the audience data.

"Yes, since you've been doing that all your life, with the piques of who we're going against, if they change our day, if they change the competitor... Now it loses emotion," Alberto Caballero jokes.

We have experience getting into puddles, but the advantage of puddles is that you have to be very clumsy to drown

In addition, they should keep in mind that Netflix's audience is not only in Spain, but also in 189 other countries, with a potential audience of 220 million viewers.

"We keep it in mind, the type of humor of the other series is at a very radical point where you could never start a series," says Laura Caballero.

“In any case, when asking about Netflix we have seen that, for a series to succeed globally, it has to succeed first in its country.

We've tried to stay true to the kind of series we wanted to do.

But in the final finish, in the dialogue and the specific joke, we have tried to move away from localisms, which is something we have been doing for a long time, ”adds her brother.

Given their history with humor, where they have gotten into all possible puddles, they are not afraid to get muddy with issues such as the new masculinities and the role of men and women in today's society.

“We have experience getting into puddles, but the advantage of puddles is that you have to be very clumsy to drown.

It's a puddle, not a rough sea.

And part of the fiction has to deal with these issues.

Comedy is the best instrument from the point of view of parodying situations that are taking place in society”, says Alberto Caballero.

“And it is a tool to educate.

Thanks to comedy, you don't feel like they're giving you a lesson or positioning or anything”, concludes Laura Caballero.

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