‘Muertos SL’ infuses the daily life of a funeral home with dark humor | Television

The actor Carlos Areces has a collection of around 150 photographs in his home post-mortem which he collected in a book in 2021. There is perhaps no person better suited to lead the cast of a comedy set in a funeral home. “My relationship with death, I suppose, is like most people’s: it obsesses and terrifies me,” says the actor, sitting in the cafeteria of this fake funeral home. “It’s a topic that intrigues and fascinates me, but I don’t have any kind of metaphysical or transcendent thought, I think it’s like this and then it ends, which tinges everything with a certain bitterness, but what are we going to do? do about it?” , he reflected last week during his lunch break while filming the second season of Muertos SL

Areces wears the uniform of Dámaso, the diligent (and somewhat mean) funeral director of Torregrosa; a climber who, upon the death of the company owner, sees the option of a promotion before him, a possibility cut short when the widow of his former boss takes over, a woman who knows nothing about the functioning of this peculiar SME.

Muertos SL is the new comedy created by Alberto and Laura Caballero together with Daniel Deorador, Julián Sastre, Nando Abad and Araceli Álvarez de Sotomayor. The eight episodes of the first season will premiere on Movistar Plus+ on April 4, while the filming of the second batch of episodes ends these days. In the warehouse of an industrial area in Navalcarnero (Madrid) they recreated a funeral home in great detail. So much so that some members of the team crossed themselves as they entered the first few days. The reception is connected to some rooms for wakes, a cafeteria and a multi-denominational room. Two floors below are the funeral home offices, the director’s office (now director), the cold rooms, the crematorium and the thanatopraxy room. Everything is equipped with real material. The writers did extensive research, visiting funeral homes to take note of a very little-known work. A thanatopraxy helped them with equipment, positioning and learning how to handle the material, and was present on set every time in the first season they shot scenes in the thanatopraxy room.

Those responsible for What’s coming, The village AND Alpha males They wanted to set their next play in a work environment. The office It is a series that is mentioned several times in the interviews in this report. “We wanted to talk about the Spanish SME. 80% of the entrepreneurial fabric is made up of this type of company, far from the model of other countries”, explains Alberto Caballero, co-creator and executive producer of Muertos SL “The theme of death is still a packaging that gives personality to the series, but we wanted to talk about work conflicts, conflicts, miseries, very gray lives, which is what amuses us. “We wanted to see people who understand why they’re not happy.”

“When you get into a series, there’s a part of you that chooses the topic because you see possibilities and it grabs your attention, and also because it’s a way to learn things. This is clearly related to the midlife crisis. The references of your childhood and youth are no longer there, you see people of your generation dying…”, says Alberto Caballero.

Adriana Torrebejano, Salva Reina, Diego Martín, Ascen López, Aitziber Garmendia, Gerald B. Fillmore, Roque Ruiz and Amaia Salamanca are some of the names in a cast full of faces familiar to fans of other Caballero series. They explain that they use their productions as a fishing ground for talent: when they discover someone who stands out in a small role, they look for ways to give them more prominence in the next story. Roque Ruiz has appeared in more than a dozen episodes of The village and Ascen López, Aitziber Garmendia and Adriana Torrebejano had had small roles Alpha males. Diego Martín and Carlos Areces are already regulars on their series. “In addition to talent, we are interested in working with very nice people. It takes longer to record because of the collegial atmosphere, but there is an energy that transcends and reaches people. We try to create groups that get along very well,” explains Laura Caballero, director and producer of the series.

The 30 minute episodes of Muertos SL They exude dark humor in situations that are in some cases very relatable and, in others, a little crazy. “It has a lot to do with the DNA of what we like about Laura and Alberto Caballero and connecting to their first series but updating it. It’s pure sitcom”, summarizes Susana Herreras, executive producer of Movistar Plus+. “In their series they always look for discomfort and reflection. Even if they seem very light-hearted, they always make jokes bordering on political correctness and raise very interesting underlying issues,” describes the producer, who points to sexual harassment, belated empowerment or work dynamics such as competition or the plug-in as some of these themes.

The most surprising situations obviously concern the mortuary theme and some of them are based on real cases. For example, preparing for an ex’s funeral after a painful breakup. Or the desire to say goodbye to a person who loves motorcycles by placing the body on a motorcycle instead of a coffin. Or funerals low cost, with coffin rental and quick wakes. “My favorite scene from the first season is a man who comes to plan his own funeral because he’s about to commit suicide. The intern helps him and he doesn’t know how to react. The thanatopractor arrives and asks him if he has thought about what kind of suicide it will be because the price changes if it has to be rebuilt. It is a scene with which, perhaps, we would have had more problems on free-to-air television”, says Alberto Caballero.

What they were clear about was that they didn’t want to appear strong or forceful gore. “We’re not doing that Right, there is no emphasis on this,” says Laura Caballero. Despite this, she remembers that when the thanatopractor explained to Adriana Torrebejano what her job was like on the first day, she had to stop for a few minutes because the actress was getting dizzy.

The Caballero brothers’ series share some aspects, beyond some actors. “They have a line of humor that I find very funny, they have always had great black humor,” says Carlos Areces. «They are capable of connecting with a large sector of the public without making easy concessions, without selling out. They go to the gardens and this puts them in contact with the public,” adds the actor. At the same time, each of his productions has its own identity. In SL dead, Laura Caballero highlights the use of zoom as a narrative element which also led the actors’ interpretation to adapt to it, with a more naturalistic touch. «This gives him the impression of reality or documentary. There are many strange points of view, as if there were someone spying…” says the director regarding the use of the camera. Also in this series there are the first improvised scenes shot by them: the funny sequences that accompany the end credits of each chapter.

Now, the Caballero brothers have to balance filming their series: What’s coming for Telecinco and Prime Video, Alpha males for Netflix and Muertos SL for Movistar Plus+. “We’re going to mess up sooner or later, but we’re trying to delay that moment as much as possible, and I hope it’s not in this one, because because of the characters and the plot and the atmosphere, I think it has a lot to give “, says Alberto Caballero. “We have a character who is on leave at the funeral home, Carmen, a character in worn outI hope we can find out who he is in season 10,” he concludes.

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