The executive spoke with ttvnews at Mipcom about El gran salto, the highly anticipated biopic about the gymnast Gervasio Deferr, which will soon be released in Spain and is preparing to make the leap to the international market.
*Produced by Luis Cabrera and Ana Paula Carreira, from Cannes, France
With a release date already reserved in Spain, El gran salto, the biopic that tells one of the most exciting stories in Spanish sport, is one of Atresmedia’s most anticipated productions.
Produced by Atresmedia Televisión, in collaboration with Diagonal (Banijay Iberia), the five-episode series will arrive on Atresplayer on November 17, bringing the life of Olympic champion Gervasio Deferr to the small screen.
The series created by José Rodríguez, based on the biography that Deferr himself tells in his book of the same name, was filmed in different locations in the province of Barcelona.
“Gervasio himself wrote a book that he brought to Atresmedia for its adaptation and we thought it was an impressive story,” Miguel García, head of International Sales at Atresmedia TV International Sales, began in a conversation with ttvnews at the current edition of Mipcom, where the group is presenting the anticipated biopic to the international market.
“There was a story of an athlete who had everything, who was in heaven, and because of bad decisions he ended up in absolute hell,” he summed up.
The series presents the story of the Olympic champion in a narration in two times: the past, with the different Olympic games that Gervasio won, and which will lead to reminiscing: Sydney, Athens and Beijing. And, on the other hand, the present, focused on the days it will take him to visit his mother, who has suffered a heart attack while in hospital. A crucial fact that will undoubtedly mark the athlete’s destiny and will lead him to set a vital goal that will save him from himself.
“Gervasio Deferr’s story is internationally known. He was one of the most important gymnasts in recent years in the international Olympic universe. He managed to do what Simon Biles is achieving in all the headlines today,” explained the executive.
“But he made a big mistake, which was that before a competition he ingested some substances and his medal was taken away. That news was so important internationally, but nobody investigated what was behind it.”
The Big Leap thus aims to tell everything behind that news, how the gymnast came to that decision and what happened afterwards both personally and professionally.
“It’s a story where you discover that Gervasio came from a family of Argentine immigrants in Spain, who weren’t having a good time, but he had the dream of competing in the Olympic Games. But not all stories are happy and that mistake dragged him to hell. It’s also a story of overcoming, of how he was able to get out of there and become a teacher for other gymnasts, to show them the right path,” García explained.
“I think it’s been a long time since a biopic of a sports character was made, one that had a story behind it that was as powerful as Gervasio’s. Where the important thing is not how he got to the top, but how he didn’t know how to stay there and how he had to be reborn.”
Actor Oscar Casas will be the protagonist of El gran salto, getting into the skin of the iconic gymnast, a role that required many months of preparation and training.
“It stars Oscar Casas, Mario Casas’ brother. It’s a role for which he should receive many awards when it is released,” said the executive. “It really is the role of a lifetime. Oscar has prepared to be Gervasio, he has modified his body, his voice, he has learned to be a gymnast. So you can see his evolution in an impressive way.”
“It is a series produced by Diagonal, one of the great Spanish production companies with which we are very happy to be partners in many projects. It will premiere on Atresplayer in the next few months and we want, or hope, that it will also be a success outside our borders,” he concluded.
