Netflix revealed on Friday that production has begun on La Regenta, an adaptation of the classic Spanish novel by Leopoldo Alas, known as Clarín.
This new adaptation brings its own spin on the much-loved novel with a fresh, feminine take. Mar Coll, who worked on Salve Maria and Three Days With the Family, will direct the film, and Ester Expósito, known for Elite and The Talent, will play Regenta.
Mar Coll, Anna R. Costa, and Diego Vega wrote the screenplay. Elastica Films will produce it, and María Zamora, whose credits include Salve Maria and Romería, will produce for Netflix for the first time.
Oriol Pla, who is known for I, Addict and The Day After Tomorrow, will play Magistral Fermín de Pas. Vito Sanz, who worked on Por cien millones and Billionaires’ Bunker, will play Víctor Quintanar, while Borja Luna, who appeared in Breathless and No Traces, will portray Álvaro Mesía.
Other cast members will be Clara Ingold (Little Faith, Iron Reign), who will play Petra; Carlos González (La bola negra, Amar es para siempre) as Frígilis; Ana Torrent (Rage, Thesis) as Doña Paula; Itsaso Arana (The Other Way Around, The Girls at the Back) as Visitación; and Gonzalo de Castro (The Final Problem, The Inmortal) as Ripamilán.
The story focuses on Ana Ozores, la Regenta, who lives in the smothering, gossipy town of Vetusta and is married to Víctor Quintanar, a comfortable but meaningless union. Beautiful yet unhappy, Ana searches for meaning in her life that the world denies her.
Inadvertently, she becomes the center of obsession for two competing parties. What begins as her private drama becomes a quiet war of desire, faith, and power, with every move she makes observed, judged, and used against her.
“Clarín’s novel is so rich that dozens of different adaptations can be made from it, like those that came before ours or those that will follow it,” Coll said. “I have tried to approach the material, humbly, from a radically personal perspective, as I always do.”
“I have made my own what has moved me most in the novel, and what explores the loneliness and heartbreak of this regent’s wife, who tirelessly longs to give meaning to her life, a more real life. A luminous character inhabiting a universe poised to prey on her. A woman whose sensitivity and stubborn search constitute, in themselves, a form of resistance.”
