With me he caused a sensation in Jugate, won a scholarship in the United States and today has a company in California: the life of Nano Recondo

Thirty years ago, when teenagers in Argentine hair salons asked for the Nano cut, there was no need to clarify too much: a well-messy throw, an intermediate level of scissors under the nape of the neck. The role model, Ignacio Recondo.

Nano, the one with facial symmetry and immaculate beauty, was one of the nine “Crismorenos”member of the second group of teenagers of Play with me. The game and music program had Cris as host haranguing an angry audience in the Telefe studios at Pavón 2444.

Today he is the king of advertising publishing. A silent Argentine who triumphs in Santa Monica, United States.

There are still videos circulating on nostalgic networks and forums of the hunk on horseback with a bare torso, the protagonist of romantic videos in that era in which MTV gave impetus to the audiovisual consumption of teenagers, long before Instagram and algorithms.

The teenagers of that clan of joy took different paths. Some retained their local fame (Luciano Castro), others have launched themselves into action beyond these boundaries (Michael Brown, the successful emigrant actor who now works in Colombia, Mexico and Spain) and others preferred books and politics (Felicitas Beccar Varelaformer provincial senator and lawyer).

Nano’s case was atypical: he abandoned the media to dedicate himself to sport and this led him to do it an American scholarship to Columbia College in Missouriwhich later transformed him into an entrepreneur in the audiovisual sector.

At 49, his just over 2,700 followers on Instagram tell of that life after the media earthquake. There is no longer any spotlight on him. Now there is its own headquarters in Culver City, a specialization in post-production and a client portfolio that includes companies such as Google, Lexus, Honda.

Living in California for more than 20 years, The one who lit up the reel screen with his bib t-shirts calls himself the “Owner”. He has just been commissioned to edit an advertisement for the Taco Bell restaurant chain, starring the comedian Pete Davidson.

His production company, TruLove Post, who celebrates ten years in Los Angeles, was born with four other Argentine partners after a tangle of destinies that curiously intersected. It is not strange that Recondo finds work from Culver City, that American city located west of Los Angeles County for McDonald’s, Pringles, SPS (United States Postal Service), AT&T.

Everything sprouted behind the garage. After helicopters, five presidents in eleven days and the end of convertibility, in 2002 Ignacio was convinced that he had to change course, without imagining that his great passion, football, could take him behind the scenes of an industry from which I dreamed of being part.

From the shortcut to owning your own business in Missouri

“It was hard for me to see myself in the future as an actor, I wasn’t someone who could deal with a lot of ‘no’s’ and Job uncertainty pushed me to try my luck with a company that took you to sporting events at universities to win a scholarship.“, says the cousin of sports journalist Gastón Recondo, more than 6 thousand kilometers away.

Rugby player and footballer at the same time, Nano had it He went on to play as an interior player for the Alumni and as a goalkeeper for the national teams. He excelled as a goalie at Golfer’s Country Club, Pilar.

For the American adventure he trained hard for almost a year at the academy of former footballer Coqui Raffo. With greasy bones, magic gloves and a few dollars saved, he traveled to Atlanta and St. Louis to show off his ball-stopping art. He eventually got a scholarship to study art.

The pact involved showing off at university games in exchange for free accommodation and study. In 2006, after four years of study, he obtained the university degree awarded by Columbia College, a prestigious institution founded in 1851.

He got his first job as an editor thanks to a cousin who was already established in the industry in Los Angeles and with whom they founded TruLove Post in 2013. “True, but without the ‘e’, ​​​​like a play on words between Spanish and English, it reflects our true love, our vocation. The team is made up of my cousin Christian Castagna, alias Voltron, Gonzalo Ugarteche, Juancho Leguizamón and a partner in Argentina, Mariano Arias”, he specifies.

“The key to starting a business here is to be skilled, have balls and contacts. Today there is no longer a need for a physical structure thanks to the possibilities offered by the virtual”, he deduces and highlights a milestone: the film Animal, directed by Armando Bó, was edited by his production company. “I played rugby with him at Alumni, in the senior team, and we went to the same school, even though I’m six years older.”

Focused on the advertising market, The Santa Monica neighbor todayAbout 30 minutes from downtown Los Angeles and used to vacationing in Maui, Hawaii, Recondo already enjoys its own rooftop under the “Townhouse” concept (“horizontal apartments sharing a wall”). Destroy any myth or romanticization of life in the North.

“The first year of adjustment was the worst,” he admits. “It was a time when connecting with Argentina was through Messenger or email. North Americans are very nice, but the cultures are different. The first thing you notice is that they don’t kiss to greet each other, but only a “hello” or a handshake, which clashes with our South American way of life to kiss, meet, be close, share.

Memories of fame

Son of an airline pilot and a stewardess, the youngest of two children, as a child Ignacio worked in advertising at the request of his uncle, an advertising director. He was the childish face of drinks and magazines like Billiken. .

Raised in Belgrano, a student at Chester College, accustomed to double school, during his senior year of high school he learned from his friend Luli that a new casting had been opened for the Telefe program and showed up at the old studios in San Cristóbal.

A couple of interviews, a dance rehearsal and a camera test were enough for him to fascinate the producers and be chosen as an actor one of the Cris’ Boys in what was the second litter of boys capable of flying with a harness and immersing themselves in colored liquids.

He still remembers when, at the end of 1992, the news rang on his landline: he had been chosen to train the new staff of the Cris cycle, which debuted on 3 June 1991 and was inspired by the American program Double challenge.

What followed in 1993 was a tsunami of popularity, screams when she stepped onto the street, desperation from fans trying to keep a lock of her blonde hair, invitations to accompany Susana Giménez in the living room or to play football with Marcelo Tinelli. There were two years of television prosperity until the cycle came to an end.

The staff of Jugato He traveled from north to south, was the symbol of half the country and doubled his working hours recording the soap opera College of Lifea rib that was part of the program.

The bubble quickly dissolved, when the “orphans” of the red light felt the tyranny of the market and the first job disappointments arrived. For Nano in 1995 there was a job at Chiquititas, but after a year his contract was not renewed and he began a journey that made him doubt the field. In 1997 he participated RRDT, with Carlos Calvo, fiction about the world of football, a universe he knew well as an international goalkeeper in real life.

The scenes in the Excursionistas’ dressing room and the hours of filming with Mariano Martínez, Chino Tapia, Ruso Verea and Diego Díaz were his last memories as an actor, the closing of a stage that promised more.

“The work was fickle, I immediately enrolled at the University of Cinema, I didn’t finish, but I found a job at the Gravity Zero production company, where I started as an assistant editor and became chief editor,” he explains. “I discovered what I was passionate about, postproduction”.

Father of Iñaki and Felicitas (1 and 4 years old), married to a midwife from Chaco, Evangelina, ten years younger, who saw him in play with menor does he think about the possible life that would have continued if he had not retired from the medium of television. “TV was clearly not my burning dream. I don’t like all the arguments in front of the camera, That’s why I admire Michel and Luciano, because they remained faithful and succeeded. “You have to have a lot of personality so that the ‘no’s don’t hurt you.”

A WhatsApp group keeps that team’s connection active Jugato whose members are around 50 years old or older. “We’ve never been able to get together at the same time again,” he laments, with his partner at his side, as if he were an extension of his body across California.

Older brother He makes his office a small Argentine Republic. “Every month we have a barbecue in Culver City with our fellow countrymen, so we don’t feel far from home. We eat entrails, standing still, moving, and play foosball.”