They contacted on Facebook. She, María Albiñana, a Valencian actress, and he, Luke Eve, an Australian director. They had many things in common. They tried in vain to meet at a couple of festivals. They came to coincide in Los Angeles, where both had settled to find a life. There, the relationship bore fruit and they decided to get married in Valencia. They set a date, March 15, 2020. They sent invitations. The Sydney filmmaker’s mother, Karen, traveled to the Mediterranean city in advance. But the coronavirus pandemic broke out and Spain was confined. The wedding was canceled and Albiñana, Eve and Karen were locked in an apartment in Valencia in a forced but profitable coexistence. The couple (she, 37; he, 47) They wrote an autofiction script, they took their last generation mobile and began to film about their frustrated wedding, their relationship with a partner, the experience of his mother, so far from home, the boredom of the rites of confinement, the accompanied loneliness, the hobbies of each one, love … All with a touch of humor.
The series was titled Cancelled, Directed by Eve and performed by both of them. They had an Australian public aid to finance it. They shot 10 episodes of about nine minutes each in English (mostly) and Spanish and released them on Facebook Watch, the video service of the social network, obtaining unexpected success. Two and a half million viewers in 48 countries watched the production, which has garnered numerous awards at international web series festivals. It is still being seen. “People still write to us asking about the wedding,” says Albiñana. “He asks us to invite them. They also tell us that they have seen their life in confinement reflected. It was three months of filming, sometimes hard. I think the mother was already fed up with us. It was complicated but, at the same time, comfortable. There was no other team than us. She wasn’t acting, it was her. As we had no other option, we took the mobile to shoot ”.
When the borders were opened, the couple thought again about getting married, but the plans were again thwarted. She got pregnant, they decided then to introduce it in the second part of the series, titled Recancelled. This Wednesday the last of the six new chapters is launched, a little longer, also by Facebook Watch, in which a surprise related to the baby is revealed. In less than four weeks, the new season has more than a million views.
In this continuation, Albiñana and Eve leave home. The pandemic is still there, but life continues in search of a lost normalcy. Valencia takes center stage: its streets, its squares, its bars, the Albufera lake … The municipal entity Visit Valencia joined the financing of the series together with Screen Australia, the Argentine platform UN3TV and the embassies of the oceanic country and from Spain. “Luke was obsessed with reflecting the light of Valencia, the orange tone of the nights in the center … We have a photo director, but we continue with the same aesthetics of the mobile, improved with a program”, explains Albiñana, who completed her training as an actress at the Actor’s Studio (USA) or the Piccolo Teatro in Milan.
“I grew up on a farm in West Sydney. Movies were my vanishing point. At the age of 20 I moved to London and devoted myself to photography, then to music videos and commercials, and finally to film and television, ”Eve notes by email. The filmmaker grew up watching films by Coppola or Polanski and later became enthusiastic about directors such as the Coen brothers, Wes Anderson, Pedro Almodóvar or Thomas Vinterberg. “But for Cancelled and ReCancelled I was probably more influenced by Noah Baumbach and Paul Thomas Anderson ”, says the director of the feature film I Met A Girl.
After presenting in a cinema in Valencia RecancelledNow Albiñana and Eve plan to return to Los Angeles, but loaded with an intense life and professional experience, with numerous followers around the world and with a five-month-old baby.
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