El Último Matrimonio Feliz
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| El Último Matrimonio Feliz | |
|---|---|
| Format | Telenovela |
| Developed by | RCN Televisión |
| Country of origin | Colombia |
| Language(s) | Spanish |
| Production | |
| Location(s) | Bogotá, Colombia |
| Camera setup | Multi-camera |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | RCN |
| Original airing | January 21, 2008 |
| External links | |
| Official website | |
| IMDb profile | |
El Ultimo Matrimonio Feliz (The Last Happy Marriage) is a Colombian telenovela (soap opera) aired since January 21, 2008 on Colombian network RCN. It has a unique format among the current aired telenovelas in Colombia because of its ensemble cast. The telenovela is in top three of the most viewed shows in Colombia on the first half of 2008 season.
Contents |
[edit] Story
Antonia Palacios (Alejandra Borrero) is the best seller on real state company GRUPO INMOBILIARIO in Bogotá, Colombia. Although she has an almost perfect family with Patricio (Ricardo Velez), her husband and a beautiful teenage daughter, Adelaida (Lina Balbuena), her job does not allow her to spend enough time with them. After almost losing her daughter for not picking her up at time, Antonia decides to leave GRUPO INMOBILIARIO and starts over with her own real state company named EN CASA. Meanwhile Barbara Mantilla (Valerie Dominguez) a beautiful women who is constantly abused by her husband Jesús (Elkin Diaz) tells her stylist Harold (Jose Luis Paniagua) that she needs a job in order to leave his husband, Harold encourage Barbara to go with Antonia to check if she can offer a job to Barbara, despite Barbara's lack of experience in real state, Antonia decides to hire her.
The last apartment sold by Antonia while working in GRUPO INMOBILIARIO is taken by a just married couple Paulina Florez (Cristina Campuzano) and Carlos Garcia (Juan Pablo Espinosa) who work together in the same company, but Carlos is elevated while Paulina is fired. Thinking she was fired because of the simple fact she was woman, Paulina discharges her frustration on Carlos making his life impossible. When Paulina goes to close the deal of the apartment with Antonia, Paulina learns that Antonia needs people to work with her, so Paulina offers herself as a seller and accounts manager.
Realizing that he has lost her best seller, Antonia's former boss Manuel Gomez (Jorge Cao) decides to sabotage Antonia's new company with some help from Emilio (Fabio Rubiano) a mediocre seller who hates Antonia and who knows Manuel's biggest secret: the woman who is his wife, Camila (Coraima Torres), was forced to marry him by her mother in exchange of money. Despite her status of rich women, Camila lacks of culture and knowledge because she did not complete her high school, this makes her only son Sebastian (Juan Manuel Lenis) to laugh of her.
Alongside with Barbara and Antonia, Camila is one of the Harold's best clients and he uses to be an adviser to them in their darkest moments. Harold's assistant Angela (Cecilia Navia) recommends a young woman to work as a maid in Harold's: Yorley Zuñiga (Yuli Ferrera) whose husband Mario Herrera (Kike Mendoza) is unemployed and refuses to work on something different which he studied for, this makes Yorley to take care of all of the family alone. Watching her wife with the weight of the world on her shoulders Mario decides to sell his house to Emilio; Emilio lies to Mario and he gets the house for an amount of money lower than he originally stated. Thinking that Antonia was the real responsible for the deal, Yorley faces Antonia and this lead them to know that Emilio was the real responsible of the deceit. Antonia decides to hire Yorley as the maid for EN CASA.
Antonia's secretary, Margot (Carmenza Gomez) is left by her husband for a younger women who does not allow him to give any cent to his wife which makes Margot to take care of her two teenage children alone, when Margot learns that Antonia is leaving INMOBILIARIA she decides to follow her, initially reluctant to hire Margot for avoiding Manuel to think she was taking people away from his company, Antonia finally hires Margot as her secretary.
Antonia's best friend and business partner, Bernardo Torres (Marlon Moreno) decides to support Antonia's new company despite Manuel's intrigues against her. Torres originally purposes Antonia to sell his biggest project: a mall, but Antonia realizes that this will lead her to work even more that she worked when she was in GRUPO INMOBILIARIO. Instead of selling new apartments and houses, Antonia moves to second hand places, which results a success. Torres who likes Yorley almost in the same second he meets her, decides to keep supporting Antonia letting her to sell a part of his newest project a whole block of apartments, this time Antonia accepts.
Despite being almost a guardian angel for Antonia, Barbara and Camila, Harold has his own issues being exploited by his love partner who is with him just for money, but things become more complicated when a closeted construction worker, Alcides comes to his life and falls in love with Harold.
Because of its large cast there are many simultaneous stories all of them getting importance as the story goes on, some of them include Sebastian's relationship with Adelaida, Barbara in a crush with Antonia's husband Patricio, Yorley's daughter working for taking money home and Camila leaving his house because of the cruel intentions of her husband and son.
[edit] Reception
Despite the previous promotional campaign for the telenovela was not as strong as previous telenovelas in its time slot as Fernando Gaitan's Hasta que la Plata nos Separe ('Til Money Do Us Apart), Pura Sangre (Pure Blood) or the newest RCN telenovela Novia Para Dos (A Girlfriend for Two Men) it reached quickly a high position in the most watched TV shows in Colombia keeping the audience from its leading Pura Sangre.
El Último Matrimonio Feliz (The Last Happy Marriage) is actually the most watched TV show on RCN network. From its premier in January 21 2008 to March 26 2008 it was the second most watched TV show in Colombia just behind its leading: dramatic and suspense telenovela Pura Sangre (Pure Blood). After Pura Sangre's finale, El Último Matrimonio Feliz fell to the third position on most watched TV shows in Colombia, but instead became the most watched TV show on RCN prime time.
El Último Matrimonio Feliz' new leading Novia Para Dos (A Girlfriend for Two Men) have not reached the high ratings Pura Sangre had and the competitor channel's Caracol TV strategy splitting its most successful telenovela in years in two parts placing another telenovela between the two parts has leaded to El Último Matrimonio Feliz to lose its original position on most watched TV shows in Colombia.
Nevertheless, the reinforcement of the prime time schedule in RCN network in the first half of May of 2008 with action-policial procedure-oriented telenovela Los Protegidos (The Protected) has made all the telenovelas in RCN network including El Último Matrimonio Feliz to get the highest postions in a role, so El Último Matrimonio Feliz usually is getting the first, second or third place in the top of most watched shows in Colombia.
The characters has been accepted extraordinarily well by the audience, not only women but men because of its very real thematic and the high grade of identification between the public and the characters. The quality of the story based on Colombian women's issues got a very much better reception than adapted version of Desperate Housewives (Amas de Casas Desesperadas) previously broadcasted on the same time slot which became sort of a mistake for RCN network.
[edit] Format
El Último Matrimonio Feliz has a unique format among the Colombian telenovelas and even the Latin American telenovelas because the story is not leaded by a female character and a male character struggling to be together after falling in love, even the six female major characters are all married or at least with a long time relationship. The telenovela bases in the six woman's struggles to go on even in her darkest situations and how work and self-confidence can give them even more than they could get from a man.
[edit] Points of Breaking
As the telenovela does not follow the traditional style of the classic telenovel (a boy and a girl struggling to be together after falling in love), it tell us how the relationships get broken because of diverse causes and factors:
Antonia and Patricio: Despite they are the happiest couple on the telenovela, when Antonia decides to hide from Patricio her health condition (she is sick with Breast Cancer), she's forced to lie to her husband, leading to an increasing mistrust from him to her. Besides this, Patricio mistrust the nature of the relationship between Antonia and Torres, believing that their friendship is much more than they say. Patricio's attraction to Barbara not only for her beauty but for her personality conduces to a fracture between them.
Barbara and Jesús: The main factor to the erosion of this relationship is the abuse Barbara was under for years, she had to accept it because she had no job, but when Jesús begins to become a better person, Barbara thinks she can have a chance with her husband, but when she discover Jesús is actually an alcoholic and she uses to hires prostitutes, she develops a deep rejection toward him, all this besides the fact that Barbara feels a deep attraction to Patricio, because he's like "the perfect man" she always have been waiting for.
Paulina and Carlos Alberto: This relationship begins to fracture when Carlos gets the job Paulina has been looking for years, besides this she is fired to complete Carlos's new and huge salary. Paulina thinks the only reason why Carlos got that job is because he is a man, so she stops having sex with him and finally she throws him away from the apartment they bought together, Carlos has to live in a hospital for weeks, time when he meet a really beutiful waitress Chantal, so he starts to date her, while Paulina after getting a considerable ammount of money for a successfull deal attempts to get Carlos back but he now thinks he's not in love with Paulina anymore, but with Chantal, after he had consumate his relationship with the waitress.
Margot and Armando: When the telenovela begins Armando already has a lover and he's left Margot and two children, Margot refuses to think Armando's left her thinking he's too bussy but later Cesar David (her son) confirms his father has an affair and he's living with that woman, this time Margot thinks is a temporary thing and avoid to think she is now alone. This relationship become more complicated when Margot has not enough money to support her two children and when she tries to ask Armando for help, he refuses because he's actually using all of his money supporting his young lover.
Yorley and Mario: The first reason of fracture between Yorley and Mario is he has no job in the moment when the telenovela starts, and he refuses to help Yorley, even when he sells the house, where they both had been working for years. Later Mario leaves to work far away from Bogotá, and Yorley thinks that maybe there is chance between her and Torres, but the deep love her daughter feel for his father makes Yorley to avoid that thought.
[edit] Ratings
April 22, 2008: 11.3. Rank: #2
April 14 to April 20, 2008: 10.8. Rank #2
April 18, 2008: Home Rating 26. Rank # 2
April 17, 2008: 11.5. Rank # 2
April 16, 2008: 10.7. Rank # 2
April 15, 2008: 10.9. Rank # 4
April 7 to April 13, 2008: 9.9. Rank # 5
[edit] Cast
Alejandra Borrero as Antonia Palacios
Ricardo Velez as patricio González
Valerie Dominguez as Bárbara Mantilla
Elkin Diaz as Jesus Espinosa
Carmenza Gomez as Margot Alvarez
Diego Velez as Armando Salgar
Coraima Torres as Camila Andrade
Jorge Cao as Manuel Gomez
Yuly Ferrera as Yorley Zuñiga
Kike Mendoza as Mario Herrera
Cristina Campuzano as Paulina Florez
Juan Pablo Espinosa as Carlos Garcia
Biassini Segura as Cesar Salgar
Fabio Rubiano as Emilio Angel
Marianella Quintero as Jenny Salgar
Jose Luis Paniagua as Harold Peralta
Cecilia Navia as Angela Murcia
Marlon Moreno as Bernardo Torres
Catherine Mira as Mireya León
Alina Lozano as Esther Pimiento
Juan Manuel Gonzales as Sebastian Gomez
Carlos Hurtado as Wimer Moya
David Galindo as Alcides Niño
Gloria Gomez as Matilde Lozano
Marcelo Dos Santos as Andrés Salamanca
Felipe Calero as Daniel
María Isabel Bernal as Olivia Herrera
Lina Balbuena as Adelaida Gonzáles
Bianca Arango as Jessica
