11 years ago a Carmen Ferreiro, newcomer to the entertainment direction of Atresmedia, had an idea that today fills the chain with joy: she wanted to recover the spirit of Antena 3 of the 90s with programs as emblematic as Surprise, Surprise and Rain of stars. From that seed that Ferreiro planted then grew, and continues to grow today, Your face sounds to me.
Everyone knows what Tú cara me suena, but few know how it was born, how it has become not only the most watched television program in Spain, but the one hundred percent Spanish format most exported abroad and how, 10 years after its birth, it continues to break audience records season after season and broadcast after broadcast.
Tonight Tu cara me suena meets the decade on television (22.00 hours on Antena 3) and without having yet premiered one of the performances of this new season has already become one of the most commented content on social networks and most watched Atresplayer. This is the performance of Andrea Guasch as Chanel with the SloMo. As Manel Fuentes tells us "the years go by but there is still magic".
To celebrate its decade, the program has prepared a big start. From the street and as a festival, the first issue of the talent show has recovered some of the most mythical contestants in its history, characterized as some of the most important numbers of the program. They will be in charge of giving way to the contestants of this edition: Alfred García, Anne Igartiburu, Agustín Jiménez, Jadel, Merche, Miriam Rodríguez, Josie, Andrea Guasch and Susi Caramelo.
All the contestants of the new edition of Your face sounds to me. ANTENNA 3
The producer guilty of Tu cara me suena is Gestmusic, but it was not the first name Ferreiro thought of. The entertainment director of Atresmedia asked different producers set formats to recover "that television in a big, familiar and spectacle". Zeppelin (Endemol) presented the first draft from which Your face would later be born. Ferreiro was "delighted" and, finally, "when we decided to go ahead, I asked Gestmusic -also from Endemol- to produce it". And then the monster was born.
The 40 country programme
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Your face sounds to me has universal ingredients, "says to EL MUNDO Tinet Rubira, director of Gestmusic Endemol when asked about the keys to a success like this program. "It's admiration for someone who has talent, what Americans call the Woh Factor. The component of music, which is a vehicle of emotions because everyone relates part of their life with soundtracks. And then a lot of sense of humor. Everyone likes to laugh," he adds.
And this is nothing more and nothing less than what Your face sounds to me: celebrities imitating artists, with music that goes back to the past and present, and a lot of laughter. are the broad strokes of a program that has been exported to 40 countries around the world and that "in the final of its first season in China surpassed in audience the closing of the Beijing Winter Olympics", reveals Rubira as a proud father of his offspring. Yes, China, Portugal, Italy, Poland, several Arab countries and even Panama where it has the crown of being the most watched broadcast in the history of television in the country.
"You always have the pressure. When you work in a generalist television, pressure is what sets the rules," responds Manel Fuentes, the visible face of Tu cara me sounds. Because marking more than 20% share in each issue is a joy, but it is also a responsibility that weighs, that you have to know how to carry it and for which you have to look for tools.
"The greatest danger of this profession is the ego and when you have worked yours and put it at the service of others you realize who needs you to take care of him more, to give him more love. It is understanding that the celebrities who participate in Your face sounds to me need a hug, or a tea with lemon, or they need you to recognize them or realize that you have had a bad week. Understand them in order to get the best out of each one. That's why no one who has participated in Your face sounds to me has never done badly, "explains the presenter.
Since the format started, this has been one of the premises of Manel Fuentes, but also of the entire team behind it and also of Antena 3. Manel Fuentes takes care of the celebrities who risk participating, while the chain is clear that a format like Tu cara me suena "deserves to find the ideal programming gap in which it can best shine". There are few programs with the decade on their backs that can say 'they don't move me from this gap in the grid'.
The secrets of the casting of Your face sounds to me
Then there is the other part, which the viewer does not appreciate in detail, but as a whole. The success of the show has a name: its casting. It is very surprising when Tinet Rubira tells you that the selection of celebrities begins even before the end of an edition. It lasts a whole year and it's not coming and kissing the saint. When an edition ends, Gestmusic has already begun to make lists of people and to see possible candidates.
"Normally there are people who approach us and then there are people to whom we extend the invitation," reveals Rubira. "It's a job like in the shadows", he recognizes because it is not only names is to see many people, see their possibilities, ask them to record themselves singing, keep in touch with them for a long time, even recommend that they attend singing classes. And little by little a first list is coming out, although never, almost until the end, is the definitive one.
Sometimes they meet someone who wants to go, but is not prepared. They do not hesitate to tell him and that person leaves, prepares on his own for a while, "and, perhaps, at two years he becomes one of the celebrities of Your face sounds to me". "It's not a casting as such. We have a lot of candidates for each casting and what happens is that someone stays or leaves, depending on the final photo." The final photo is none other than people who sing, people who have a sense of humor, who dance, who represent both young and old, who come from all over Spain ... "That is, that everyone feels represented by them," concludes the producer.
Chenoa, Carlos Latre and Lolita, jury of Tu cara me suena. ANTENNA 3
Humor, talent, music, casting and a production job that few TV shows have. In the first seasons of Tu cara me suena the idea was "that the famous guy came out and that's it, because it was funny," says Rubira. Now, that alone does not count. Now such a global staging is done that care is taken of until the movement that the guitarist has to make so that it is the same as the original.
The producer says that to copy the dresses of some performances the costume team has had to draw the print because "it is impossible to buy it in a store". "We copy everything from the original performance, from the realization, the objects or the lights because we understand that the audience is getting smarter and more demanding and that they are not going to settle for a simple imitation," he says.
And, of course, Manel Fuentes, the third leg of this ripod that wrapped the baby in his arms and has cared for ever since. The metaphor may sound corny, but he is clear that it is so. "Your face sounds to me demands everything I learned in my career, from my years of sports journalism, my informative work, my nose for CQC and what I learned in Martian Chronicles to be able to pull the program at a certain time," says the presenter. A baggage that let him know from minute one that he saw the project that it was going to be a success. It demands a lot, it presses him a lot, but "the pressure becomes love and we hope that this love story, because this is an authentic love story, lasts 10 more years".
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