Adrián Suar: “I still have the body for action films”

The scene is almost surgical. Adrian Suar and Maggie Civantos enter the restricted area of ​​a (fictionally recreated) laboratory incognito, and any false move that hinders the ongoing mission compromises them. There is tension, exchange of glances and a threatening atmosphere which, up to the cry of “cut”, plays a crucial role in the outcome of the operation. Check matethe new action comedy with Suar and the Spanish star of Vis a Vis AND The Cable Girls.

But Suar’s return to cinema, premiering in theaters on January 25th and then streaming on Amazon Prime Video, is not only based on a golden return to the genre that saw him take off with Poli thief on TV (1995-1997) and Wild cards in the cinema (1997). It is the mix of an international cast, which is complemented by the Israeli actor Tsahi Halevi (Feud) and the Mexican comedian José Eduardo Derbez, who completes the project directed by Jorge Nisco.

“It’s my idea. A police officer who had been in his head for about four years and he knew that at some point he would have to pay his dues. It has touches of humor, but it’s not a hilarious comedy,” clarifies Suar, who is also the producer of the film. In Check mate plays a secret agent (Duque), who leads a special brigade to save his niece, kidnapped by the villain of the story (Mike Amigorena). The adventures will be chained between fights, explosions and some gags.

“I wanted to return to this format. I haven’t done action films for a long time because I prefer comedies and other things. It was like going back a little to what we had done Wild cards (again directed by Nisco) in 1997”, analyzes Suar.

“You will see the high level he has. Many years passed, everything related to technique and special effects improved. Federico Cueva, a specialist in action scenes, worked with us (Torrent 4 AND 5the Series El Cid) who now lives in Spain and also makes films for India”.

One thing to keep in mind: Check mate It will be the first Argentine fiction film to be released in 4D E-Motion theaters. What does this imply? That the viewer will be able to perceive wind, vibrations and aromas in sync with what happens on the screen.

The brigade inside

Filming began in Mendoza and continued in Buenos Aires. The pairings, lunches and trips out of town in Buenos Aires, with Suar as a guest, become part of a parallel itinerary. “I invited them to dinner, to the theater. I will miss them a lot because I got along very well with them,” confirms Suar regarding the established chemistry. And he adds: “Maggie is divine, I want her to stay. We all get along without knowing each other, which is unusual. The same thing happened with the rest of the cast: Mike Amigorena, Benjamín Amadeo and Charo López.”

“It’s my first time in Argentina and I loved the food. I was very nervous at the idea of ​​working in a country where I didn’t know anyone, but I was surprised by my colleagues”, underlines Derbez, the Mexican of the group, who with Check mate debuts in the action genre. His character in the brigade of agents “is a fan of tequila, obviously, and he really likes dynamite and explosions, and that’s what he does.” Derbez was fascinated by Mendoza for the landscapes (“which helped us a lot with the chase shots and shootouts”) and also for the vineyards (“spectacular!”).

Equally enthusiastic, albeit with a history of visits to Buenos Aires, Halevi, the star of Feudwhat does it has to do with it Check mate he plays a computer specialist: “So far no Israeli has worked in Argentine cinema. It’s something very special to shoot so far from my country. I didn’t know Suar, but my wife did. Then I started watching her films and here I found a generous, funny person who, despite being who she is, understands teamwork”.

Among the challenges that await him, this actor and musician who speaks five languages ​​intends to perfect his Spanish: “After serving in the Israeli army, at the age of 22, I came to Argentina a couple of times and I had a girlfriend of here who helped me a lot to learn spanish. I also have a two year old son who speaks Arabic, Hebrew, English and already speaks Spanish. “My wife speaks Spanish well because she learned it from soap operas.”

“I’ve been lucky enough to make dramas, comedies, action films and it’s always nice to know that what you do is successful and recognized in the world,” says Halevi, who during his incognito stay in Argentina couldn’t help but cross paths with fan. from the famous Israeli Netflix series. “They asked me what I was doing here, but I couldn’t say anything,” she says.

Pushing for this to happen “with the perfect blueprint,” Maggie Civantos broke the ice in the country that knows her for her celebrity in popular streaming series: “For me, Argentina had something familiar about it and I came with all the expectations of the world. I’ve had loyal followers here for years and others have joined the Vis a Vis boom. What’s happening to me is that I’m very homesick and I don’t want to leave. Everything went well and I hope it’s the beginning of a career in Argentina, because I feel like I’m leaving a little piece of my home.”

Civantos admits that, amidst the setbacks of filming, he treated himself to a meeting with the Buenos Aires fans “that I felt I owed them” and a well-deserved trip to finish filming to Iguazú Falls, Bariloche and San Martín de los Andes. “I only had six days free, but then I would like to go to the North and see Salta,” he clarifies.

Civantos’ “Argentinianization” is profound, to the point that he brings his own companion equipment with him: “I take it and I feel at home. They say that there is a very strong bond between Spain and Argentina and it’s not a lie, I feel it.”

It was the Argentine actor Esteban Meloni, with whom he filmed the series Squeezewhich first enticed him and now it has become a habit.

On his role in Check mate, he says: “I feel very comfortable in action because I’ve done a lot, but I haven’t done comedy for a while and together with Adrián, who is a genius, I’ve learned a lot. He gives me a lot of security, he supports me and I thank him for that.” In Spain, a moment of rest awaits her (“I’m stopping a bit because I’ve just made three projects in a row”) and a meeting with her producer (“I want to concentrate there”).

put the body

“I think that Check mate It will be an important film in my career as a producer and actor”, predicts Adrián Suar. And it is likely that his confidence will be supported in the effectiveness of the screenplay by Leandro Calderone and in the direction of Nisco, with whom he has collaborated for thirty years, but also in the fact that he put his all into the filming, to the point of ending up with several bruises. Playing the daring Duke took him two months of rehearsals just to practice punches, falls and grabs.

“I didn’t train a particular martial art but fight choreography. She devoted two weekly practices of several hours to learning the movements outlined in the script. Obviously during filming I was hit and beaten, but I have the ability to copy certain choreographies and give the impression of being James Bond. I like doing it, I’m not afraid. And even though we were very careful, obviously I ended up with some bruises, nothing serious beyond two or three days of pain,” she points out.

“It still gives me the physique for action movies, but it demands a lot from you in the fighting and running scenes. The melee is cool, and even though I did most of the shots, I had stand-ins because going through glass still doesn’t work for me,” she clarifies with humor.

Check mate It is a return to the origins in his professional career, but also a reunion with a cinema that he likes very much as a spectator: “I like watching action films. The classics, for example: Mission Impossible, James Bond… There are countless products in the world with these characteristics that are good. With Check mateDepending on the budget available, we were up to what is being done internationally. This gives me a lot of pride.”

29 years ago, in January 1995, Suar’s first action hero, Nene Carrizo, that charming criminal of Poli thief, He gave his first shots. “Acting is a game: it’s making others believe that the fiction they see is real. Check mate It’s like going back to being that 25 year old boy who came running Poli thief. Those were my beginnings and I really enjoy coming back from time to time.”

One thing is beyond doubt: Suar never irons. Macerating what is about to happen, Eltrece’s programming director turns his weapons against the theater. This in addition to including the final farewell of Piaff in March (work he produces with Preludio, as well as Let’s vote) receives 2024 involved in the production of rock schoolthe musical, together with Carlos Rottemberg, and another promising bet: Congratulations, a comedy directed by Daniel Veronese, at the El Nacional theatre, which he will produce and star in together with Griselda Siciliani (his former partner), Benjamín Vicuña, Jorgelina Aruzzi and Peto Menahem. The idea, according to him, would be to raise the curtain around May.

-You’re tired of repeating that, as a social fact, cinema is unbeatable. What position do you take in the face of the push and pull between platforms, with films’ time on the poster becoming increasingly shorter?

-I think that little by little the two ends are becoming friends. The platform is important because it also gives a lot of visibility to cinema, it is a way to enter. In this case, Amazon, which supports Check mate and allows us to film it. Theatrical cinema is a unique, unrepeatable, non-transferable experience. But little by little a mix is ​​being generated between the two formats: respecting those five or six weeks at the cinema, which are a lot, and then going to the platform with the push of having done well on the big screen. With Ricardo Darín’s latest film (Argentina, 1985) step forward. She broke it in theaters, then it went on the platform, did very well and continued to run in theaters.

Eternal standard-bearer of fiction (he is the artistic producer of the Argentine series jealous that Netflix will broadcast and has just finished shooting the film I can not live without you, with actress Paz Vega in Spain), Suar confirms that there will be no room for new strips on the eltrece grid in the short term. “In 2024 there will be no fiction. We’ll see later. I want to rethink a little about how everything continues, but not about fiction this year, ”he says bluntly, in a dimly lit context for telling stories on open TV.

For a while, he warns, there will be new projects that will involve him as a director, with the intention of repeating the pleasant experience that his debut film left him with, 30 nights with my ex. “It’s a one-way trip and I’ll definitely do it again,” she promises.