"Writing with success in mind rarely works."
Ignacio del Moral, scriptwriter of 'Cuéntame', shared with MGA students some of his professional experiences.
Ignacio del Moral liked theater since he was a child. He began writing not so much to develop complex plots but to delve into the word. Unlike television or cinema, theater allows him to delve into another world. "It's a way to get even with the need to rush, to have so many things happen, to have the word be so functional," he explains. The theater allows him to recreate himself. However, he has spent a good part of his life constructing TV stories.
Throughout his degree program as a screenwriter, Ignacio del Moral has plotted the adventures of Tadeo Jones (for which he won a award Goya), has imprisoned criminals with El Comisario (of which he is particularly proud) or has kept open the Farmacia de Guardia. Now he has gone back to the eighties and rewrites the history of Spain in Tell me how it happened. He is the scriptwriter of some of the series that have marked the Spanish primetime and shared a session with the students of Master's Degree in Audiovisual Script (MGA).
Del Moral commented on some details regarding the television industry in Spain, "very spasmodic and with little serenity to plan in the medium and long term". He explained that this is due to the conception of audiences: reference letter is television and they are measured from one day to the next. So professionals must "bet on proposals that are not very risky, focused on avoiding any subject of rejection and not so much on getting the public excited". He added that this need to sell "a lot and all at once" is what generates an "average" in national series.
On the other hand, he assured the MGA students that "writing with success in mind rarely works, because it is very difficult to guess what the audience's reaction will be". He also shared with them specific examples he has dealt with during the three seasons he has been working on Cuéntame, in which he has tried to introduce some renovations in both style and content. But, in the end, "when a model is consolidated, it is not good to touch it, even if people think that it is repeated", he assured.
In addition, Ignacio del Moral explained the different stages through which the script for a series is constructed and the modifications it undergoes throughout the process. He commented that, although it is true that screenwriters are not equally valued everywhere -comparing their status with that of American professionals-, their role is still just as important. "Producers think about economic viability; actors, about their character; the director, about the chapter; technicians think about the minute to minute... but only the scriptwriter has an overall vision that integrates all these aspects. Hence the importance of a solid, well-crafted script.
During his workshop in the School of Communication, Ignacio del Moral also participated as a jury member in the public defense of the scripts prepared by third year students of Audiovisual Communication for the subject Fiction Script I (TV) taught by Professor Ruth Gutiérrez.