SALTILLO COAHUILA. – Having worked alongside actor Brendan Fraser, recent winner of the Oscar in the category of Best Actor, thanks to his role as a morbidly obese English teacher in the movie “The Whale”, for the filmmaker from La Laguna Salvador Montenegro is a pride, since in his experience of sharing many moments with the actor when they filmed the miniseries “Texas Rising” in Durango, he learned that simplicity and humility are the most important things to continue keeping his feet on the ground.
“I was very pleased to find out that Brendan won the Best Actor category, and these photos that I have with him are evidence, a testimony of your work, everything is going down in history,” said the filmmaker from La Laguna.
When questioned about his experience when he worked alongside the also protagonist of “George of the Jungle” and “The Mummy”, Montenegro shared.
«It happens that one day, more than five years ago, Julian Bucio called me to work, it was about «Texas Rising», a series where he was the director of the area of dangerous actions, but he was also in charge of the main actors , among them were Brendan Fraser, Ray Liotta and Bill Paxton, who did a great job, then Julian tells me that we would work with horses, he stressed to me, now I want you as an action rider, you will be close to the actions but you will be with the actors, you are going to be a translator assistant wrangler, because of your English, “replied Salvador Montenegro.
He recalled that a month before filming began, the actors arrived at a place in Durango, where the horses were, and they began to get acquainted with them.
«We got acquainted with the horses, with whom they were going to work and Julian tells me, you are going to go to the set and you will be in charge with the actors, depending on the first or second unit, it depends on the actions that are going to be carried out, not because one is more important than another, but it is so that everything is more controlled.
Salvador lived with the actors for several days, and more with Fraser, with whom a beautiful friendship developed.
«Specifically speaking of Brendan, in the scenes nobody dubbed him, he was doing them, it took a lot of practice with the horse, and a friendship developed with him because for three weeks, they assigned me not to leave him at all, very cool experience, because already here in talks, he is a normal person, very talkative, very simple, but when we were on the set and when it was time to film, he is a very tough actor, with a lot of character, he spoke everything in English, if anything in Spanish I just said, good morning, thank you.”
The lagoon man confessed that Brendan has been one of the actors with whom he has lived the most in preparation before filming.
«We finished practicing, he gave me his horse and I caressed it, then he congratulated us, he said, it was a great day at work, there is a very messy scene where a bridge explodes and burns on fire, he did that very dangerous scene, there were three or four days of practice and we would go horseback riding for a long time.
“Texas Rising” is a miniseries on the History Channel, which shows the story of Santa Anna, how those battles were, and Montenegro added that he really enjoyed living with and working with the actor.
«Working with a person of that stature, are very cool experiences, and after life for me, an ordinary mortal being puts me with those great actors, it is a blessing, because there are very special actors, if they do not like the gentleman If they don’t like the horse, or the treatment of the people who are with them, they say so and they can take you away in the blink of an eye for not doing your job well, and when you stay in a production it’s a huge job, which sometimes when we see a film we break it down, destroy it, and put it together to our liking, but we never see what may be behind it ».
The Laguna filmmaker recalled that a few years ago Fraser went through a difficult situation of depression and moved away from the big screen, so now that he returned to film and wins Best Actor, he was very pleased.
“I was very pleased that he won, for all the difficult times he went through a long time ago, he gained a lot of weight, little by little he has been recovering, and with this Oscar award, I think he is going to go up.”
Montenegro shared that Brendan is a friend on Instagram and maintains good communication with him.
«Maybe sometimes there are people behind the actors, but sometimes I send him a greeting, I even send him some photos from when we worked in Durango, so that he has them as a memory, and he tells me, okay, thank you, big this day , and I think that if they say hello to you, it is because they remember you, you get to live with them for hours and hours and it was a very nice experience».
Montenegro announced that more projects are coming in his acting career, it is an animated film about a cowboy where he will be the protagonist, but when the project is more advanced, he will give details about it.
In conclusion, he said that the work has crystallized over the years, “and having worked with actors of that stature and seeing that he went through strong crises, stopped his activity and suddenly up is an example for everyone, because all the Human beings have ups and downs, all this is motivation, the past is part of our history, and history is what gives you a present and prepares you for the future. (With information from MILLENNIUM)
