The 9th edition of the event, which will host more than fifty activities for professionals and the general public over the next three days, was inaugurated last evening with an event supported by the Government of Castilla-La Mancha, Unifrance, the Institut Français of Spain and the Canadian Embassy.
Cuenca becomes the heart of the international media sector this week with the start of the ninth edition of Conecta Fiction & Entertainment, officially inaugurated last night with an Opening Ceremony held in the emblematic Church of San Miguel. The opening event, organised in collaboration with the Government of Castilla-La Mancha, Unifrance, the Institut Français of Spain and the Canadian Embassy, marks the beginning of an intense week of professional activity in a unique UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The Ceremony was attended by prominent institutional authorities and representatives of the collaborating entities, as well as executives and professionals from the media sector from Europe and the Americas. Patricia Franco, Regional Minister of Economy, Business and Employment of Castilla-La Mancha, used her speech to announce the two winning projects of the 3rd Castilla-La Mancha Feature Films and Series Competition, with a prize of €100,000 for each winner.
“In the regional category, the project selected is Piedra, papel o tijera (Rock, Paper, Scissors), by the Toledan production company Altamira Entertainment”, a story about relationships with a cast that includes Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, José Coronado, Irene Escolar and Chino Darín. Meanwhile, in the national category, the award goes to La Celestina, “a modern take on the classic by Fernando de Rojas that will be directed by Tina Olivares”, with actresses such as Esmeralda Pimentel and Juana Acosta in the cast.
During her welcome speech, the director of Conecta Fiction & Entertainment, Géraldine Gonard, highlighted the “privilege we have this year of having France and Canada as focus countries, two powerful markets with a highly competitive content industry on the international scene, which will find in Cuenca and Castilla-La Mancha the ideal setting for developing future co-productions and joint projects”.
Gonard also wanted to highlight the support provided this year by the Directorate General of Cultural Industries of the Spanish Ministry of Culture, and then gave the floor briefly to the representatives of the institutions and entities collaborating with Conecta Fiction & Entertainment 2025 present in San Miguel: Marta Tirado, Councillor for Tourism, Historical Heritage and Business Promotion of the City Council of Cuenca; Jeffrey Marder, Canadian Ambassador to Spain; Laurent Coulon, Cultural and Audiovisual Attaché at the French Embassy in Spain; and Antonio Hens, Institutional Audiovisual Director of Fundación SGAE.
The event also served to strengthen cultural and business ties between Spain, France and Canada, reaffirming Conecta Fiction & Entertainment’s vocation as a meeting point between Europe and the Americas, and as a platform to promote emerging talent and innovation in the content industry.
An intense inaugural day
Throughout Monday there was also an intense programme that combined strategic thinking, high-level networking and an international premiere. The day began with Conecta Creative Lab, a premium meeting space held at the Hospedería del Seminario where entrepreneurs, investors and global experts were able to discuss trends, share experiences and seek innovative solutions to the current challenges facing the audiovisual industry worldwide. The activity included the presentation of the European Audiovisual Observatory reports, followed by the sixth edition of Conecta Think Tank (a discussion forum that used the Design Thinking method for the first time) and a Trilateral Meeting between professionals and institutions from Canada, France and Spain to foster strategic alliances and international co-production between the three nations.
In the afternoon, the Teatro Auditorio José Luis Perales hosted the premiere on the big screen and open to the public of the series Zorro, a Paramount+ and France Télévisions co-production filmed in Castilla-La Mancha, which will soon be released by AMC+ in Spain. The series, starring French actor Jean Dujardin, offers a renewed vision of the legendary hero. The screening was attended by the leading actress Audrey Dana, who shared details about the production, its contemporary approach and anecdotes from the filmmaking process.
Conecta Fiction & Entertainment continues until Thursday 19 June, giving way now to three days of activities for professionals at Teatro Auditorio José Luis Perales and Hospedería del Seminario, which will include international pitching sessions, keynotes with global entertainment leaders, networking spaces and exclusive presentations of new content. In this edition, Canada and France take on a special role as focus countries, reflecting the event’s commitment to international co-production and intercontinental collaboration.
CONTENT STRANDS OF THE 2025 PROGRAMME
International pitching sessions
The five pitching sessions for international projects at Conecta Fiction & Entertainment allow creators, scriptwriters and producers to present their projects to commissioners and investors, offering a high-value platform for visibility as confirmed by the thirty born in Conecta series that were presented for the first time in past editions of the forum and that have already been produced.
Of the 438 proposals received this year, only 28 have passed the cut of the exhaustive Editorial Committees, composed of TV industry experts from all over the world. These 28 finalists will participate in the five thematic pitches: Copro Series (scripted series and mini-series); Direct to Streaming Movies (movie projects designed for direct release on streaming platforms); Music Series (series where music plays a fundamental role); Docudrama Series (dramatized documentary series); and Innova Formats (interactive entertainment formats). In addition to these, up to six projects will participate in the Pitch Fundación SGAE after having been selected in the Foundation’s 12th Laboratory for the Creation of Television Series.
The winners of the 20 awards will be announced at the Awards Gala to be held on Wednesday 18th at Teatro Auditorio José Luis Perales from 7:30pm.
Focus Countries 2025: France and Canada
This year’s focus countries will be the protagonists of seven sessions in which executives from broadcasters, distributors and production companies will present their international co-production strategies. The Canadian delegation will share a table with the Spanish ICAA to analyse opportunities for collaboration between the two countries, and will explore D.E.I. (diversity, equity and inclusion) policies in their content. On the French side, the top executive of Gaumont Television will give an exclusive keynote, the latest trends in the French market will be presented by the consultancy firm Glance-Médiamétrie, and the legacy of the crime genre in serialised fiction will be analysed.
Conecta DIGITAL
Inaugurated last year as a parallel section within the official Conecta programme thanks to the collaboration of the Ministry of Culture and financed by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, Conecta DIGITAL returns with a second edition to once again create links between the latest tech trends and new opportunities in the creation of digital content. In this first phase, developed within the programme that Conecta offers these days in Cuenca, the panels with the Conecta DIGITAL seal will deal with current issues such as the legal aspects of artificial intelligence by the European Audiovisual Observatory, the construction of entertainment brands in this digital era by a production giant like Banijay, female leadership in the digital future, or a showcase of the format ‘Dancing with robots’, a dance talent show between celebrities and AI-driven robots co-developed by Phileas and Beta Entertainment Spain.
In addition, at the Awards Gala on Wednesday 18th, the five winning projects of the Conecta DIGITAL Award will be announced: those that best incorporate elements of digital creation from among all the participants in the pitching sessions will receive a programme of individual mentoring sessions and on-site accreditation for the second phase of Conecta DIGITAL, which will take place next November.
Commissioners, content and business trends, or the importance of glocal
After the great success of last year’s edition, the Commissioners Uncovered sessions are back in full force, with new programming managers from Spanish, European and American broadcasters and platforms share their content needs, what they produce, what they acquire and the best way to contact them. Participating companies include Prime Video (Spain), NBCUniversal Telemundo (USA), YLE (Finland), Bell Media (Canada), RAI (Italy), WarnerBros Discovery (Spain), Globoplay (Brazil), RTP (Portugal), Atresmedia (Spain), RCN (Colombia) and Movistar Plus+ (Spain).
The keynotes offered on Tuesday 17th by some of the most influential consultancy firms in the tv sector will once again shed light on global content trends: the prestigious The Wit will present data on fiction and entertainment formats with a European focus, while Fabric will analyse the growing importance of non-scripted content in Latin America.
One of the most surprising panels on Wednesday will be Mapping the Future: Discovering Business Models, in which international production companies will share their experience in finding new ways to produce, sell and finance their series. The glocal note will be provided by the session Location Match by Castilla-La Mancha Film Commission, where producers, talents and film commissions from the Spanish territory will present success stories of their joint work in different shootings; as well as the round table dedicated to the regional public broadcasters of Spain’s FORTA, which will explain their current commitment to fiction in co-official languages and their collaboration models.
Conecta FICTION FEST the section of Conecta open to the general public
After yesterday’s kick-off with the screening of Zorro, the Teatro Auditorio José Luis Perales continues to host Conecta FICTION FEST, the festival open to the general public that offers new opportunities to bring major international series to the citizens of Cuenca. This afternoon at 5:30pm there will be a panel on literary adaptations to the screen, with the participation of three of the most outstanding Spanish authors on the current scene, whose novels have been adapted into worldwide successful series and films: Juan Gómez-Jurado, author of the trilogies Reina Roja (Red Queen) and Todo arde; María Dueñas, creator of El tiempo entre costuras (The seamstress) and La templanza (A vineyard in Andalusia), or the series Los artistas for ViX; and Manel Loureiro, creator of the trilogy Apocalypse Z, whose first instalment became the most watched international original film in the history of Prime Video last December.
Also today, from 8pm, the first episode of The incredible story of Julia Pastrana, the new series starring Fátima Molina and Eduardo Noriega, produced by BTF and which in Latin America will have its debut on Disney+, will be screened. And to round off the festival, tomorrow at 5pm ‘Favàritx’ will be showcased, the first Spanish series set and filmed on the island of Menorca, which was awarded at the seventh edition of Conecta held in Toledo.
