BTF Media Opens Chile Office with ‘Suspended Mourning’s’ Hernan Caffiero
By John Hopewell
LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Marking further expansion on the Spanish-language TV scene, BTF Media, producer of smash hit series “Hasta que the conocí” and “El secreto de Selena,” has teamed with Hernán Caffiero, creator of Intl. Emmy Award winning “The Suspended Mourning,” to open a new production office in Chile.
The new Chilean production house forms part of the growth of BTF Media, which already has offices in the U.S., Mexico, Argentina and Spain.
Announced via a written statement by BTF Media’s founding-partners Francisco Cordero and Ricardo Coeto, the new venture will see Caffiero heading up the office with Cordero and Cueto.
Caffiero broke out to global attention with “The Suspended Mourning” (“Una historia necesaria”).
Crafted a gutting, the 2018 Intl. Emmy short series winner delivered brief vignettes of desaparecidos under Pinochet: the impact on loss on loved ones, what happened to them, if known from recent DINA agent confessions.
Last October, Caffiero won two of the biggest incentive awards from the National Television Council of Chile for the short fiction series “Voces Anonimas,” detailing 16 cases of machista violence and its legacy; and “Raza Brava,” an eight-part origins doc series about two young friends who rise to become leaders of the biggest and violent barra brava – soccer supporters gang – in Chile.
Caffiero told Variety at February’s Berlin Festival that he was in development on two series about human rights crimes and the effects of police brutality in Chile, one a four-part documentary, the other “The Suspended Mourning,” Season 2, focusING on the victims of police violence triggered by protests that began in Chile in October.
BTF Media’s entry into Chile comes as the country’ top creative talent has begun to build a small but high-quality drama series production industry which, like its film counterpart a decade before, has punched way above Chile’s weight outside the country. Introduced to the market at 2019’s MipTV, and opening June’s Conecta Fiction, “Invisible Heroes,” marked a pioneering co-production between Finland’s Kaiho Republic.
The first international series production from Chile’s Fabula, and first fruit of a production-distribution alliance with Fremantle, the Lucía Puenzo showrun “La Jauría” (“The Pack”) was a standout at late March’s online Series Mania.
Produced by Chile’s Invercine & Wood (“Ramona,” “Mary & Mike”) and Germany’s Storyhouse Productions, “Dignity,” a thriller about the hunt for a former Nazi, was the first original series order at Germany’s Joyn, a Discovery-ProSiebenSat1 joint venture. The three series joined Caffiero’s “The Suspended Mourning” for a Chilean Series on the Rise showcase at this year’s Berlinale.
“Chile is an increasingly important market within the industry,” said Ivonne Vela, BTF head of communications.
She added: “We are very happy to open a new office in this territory together with Hernán Caffiero, who is one of the most outstanding showrunners in Latin America and who has a vast number of audiovisual projects that will be added to the BTF Media portfolio.”
