Success After Success: Talking to Alex García About his Meteoric Career in the Spanish Film Industry

A familiar face on both small and large screens, Alejandro Juan García Fernández, known by all as Álex García, has masterfully breathed life into a variety of roles that have made us laugh, moved us to tears, and left us brimming with joy. His magnetism and acting prowess have been showcased in popular television and streaming series such as ‘Sin tetas no hay paraíso’, ‘Tierra de Lobos’, and ‘Antidisturbios’, not to mention films including ‘Kamikaze’ and ‘Seis puntos sobre Emma’. Recently, he has been working on the freshly debuted film ‘Una vida no tan simple’ and two series: ‘El Inmortal’ and ‘Sagrada familia’.

In our exclusive interview, we delve deeper into the world of this versatile actor. Revel in his funniest off-camera stories, discover what music he listens to for motivation, and get a glimpse into his fashion preferences. And naturally, he imparts insights about his main role in ‘Una vida no tan simple’, a cinematic experience you wouldn’t want to miss.

• Tell us about your character, Nico, in ‘Una vida no tan simple’

For me it’s a character that I knew, that is described first, almost archetypically, we all know someone like that in college or at work. He is an easily recognized character, the one who doesn’t have a girlfriend and goes out through apps, looking for someone to fill that loneliness. I feel that he is a character with an innocent look, who is a good friend and who makes mistakes during the film, but to surprise you with a personality that puts up a wall and shows outwardly a totally false happiness, it does give a step forward in the film, and that was, for me, one of the focuses of action with Félix Viscarret (director) to say. For me, it was important that we tell that the character is how Nico can move forward. Because in the end in comedy, it’s always like that, they start lost and end up lost. But it shouldn’t be like that, today everyone is evolving and movies are a good channel to help people grow.

• Do you have any funny stories during the shooting that you can tell us?

The first day, when I arrived on the set, they were cutting for lunch and I was going to have wardrobe and hairdressing tests. So they said “Let’s eat here” and I was coming from a hyper-healthy diet. Of course, zero alcohol, zero coffee, and no processed foods. Well, they were eating in one of those crowded Chinese places, an o pen buffet. I mean the worst of the worst of everything fried preheated precooked and I got there and I was like ‘I just want to eat something healthy’. That didn’t happen during the shooting, it was nothing but because that day I had to eat there for practical reasons, but I arrived and said ‘well, get ready for the shooting to begin’ and then nothing really happened, but it was very funny. Ana Polvorosa looked at me and looked at my shocked and amazed face and said ‘But is this like this every day?’

• What is something you like to do to disconnect after an intense day of shooting?

Nowadays I really do it when the day is over, even when they say “cut”. At the cut your work is over. When they cut, you breathe and our job is not only to transmit it with total verisimilitude but also not to take the work home with us, for our health.

Right now, I’m working on ‘The Immortal’ with a 7-year-old girl. We did a scene that emotionally was a strong burden for her, she had to cry for something very big that had happened to her, and luckily now there are child caregivers, which before there never were, or there were, but at another level, and they talked to her about the ‘Circle of Illusion’. And they told her ‘when you cut you have to laugh with Alex’, as if to somehow teach her to cut with that. And I listened to it and I thought, ‘this is for children and for adults’. That circle of illusion seemed to me a beautiful image that, taken to the innocence of a child, does not have to lose value because I am 40 or 60 years old, in the end what you do in filming is to create a circle of illusion in which the camera is inside that circle or from outside it records it, but that’s where it all begins and ends. Nowadays, for me it is important to enjoy life with the crew in the cut.

• Last year you enjoyed Cannes in person, what impressed you the most?

We had a great time, the whole team danced a lot. The most anecdotal thing that I loved was the promenade that they have and the brightness of the sea of Cannes, which is unique. The nature there was spectacular, and as a big geeky thing, they told me that I had to go to eat at a restaurant where Picasso had painted in his time and where they had a Picasso museum and they kept the same menu that Pablo Picasso ate when he lived there. They kept it from the time with snails, with salad, with vegetables and so on, so I asked the festival to put a car for me. They charged me a lot of money, to be honest, but it was worth it. There are times when you make decisions that are from the heart and then you worry about the money.

The good thing was that we got to the town. It was a beautiful village in the middle of the mountains, a village of artists, everybody painted there, and there were several works of Picasso exhibited in this restaurant that was about 50 minutes or an hour from Cannes and I think it was one of the most beautiful things I did in Cannes.

• When you attend an important festival, do you hire a stylist or do you dress on your own?

Well, look, I’ve been there many times and today I don’t believe in everything that generates the stylist’s world. Many times because of doubts, because I thought I had to be dressed up or in a certain way, I have gone in and I understand perfectly well, because I have been there for many years, those who choose to have a stylist.

This is what I have in my closet, and tomorrow, probably, when I go to dinner I will wear this too and I understand that when you are asked for an etiquette you have to respect it, but above all you have to respect yourself. And many times stylists, as they are part of a very big business, don’t usually help at the level that I would understand the work of a stylist.

• What concert are you looking forward to going to?

I just went to the Coldplay concert. And the truth is that it is the best event or show I’ve ever seen. That and C Tangana’s, but for emotional reasons, because my brother is the director, and I felt a sense of family pride because he is very good. He has always offered a much more meditated work and in Tangana I feel that it has been one of the first times, at least with a Spanish artist, in which the total show has been taken into account and in fact they made a cinematographic approach that I loved. So these are the last two that I have enjoyed.

Right now I would go to Juan Luis Guerra, because of childhood memories, because I am from the Canary Islands and I was born listening to Juan Luis Guerra in the background.

• Imagine that now you are going out to a party. Which artist would you like to go out with?

Well, I don’t know because I don’t believe all the images they give us of themselves. So I don’t feel like I know any of the people on TV. In fact, I’ve started watching ‘Idol’ and it seems like contemporary social horror to me. It’s horrible because it’s real. So now when they try to sell me a Rosalia or a Tangana, and everyone has their opinion about them, it seems to me like an evil of our time. I don’t know, I prefer to go out with a friend.

• Which international actor or actress would you like to work with?

I’ve always had a weakness for looking like Ethan Hawk, for his movies, for where he approaches his characters from and I’ve also seen theater and I’ve been inclined to do what I’ve done. So I guess someday we will coincide.