Mexican TV series or program
La Madrastra
(English:
The Stepmother
)
[1]
is a Mexican
telenovela
. It was produced by
Televisa
and broadcast on
Canal de las Estrellas
in Mexico from Monday, February 7, 2005, through Friday, July 29, 2005. The program became an unexpected success, garnering ratings in excess of 30 points.
[2]
Starring
Victoria Ruffo
and
Cesar Evora
, who last appeared together in 2000's
Abrazame muy fuerte
, along with
Eduardo Capetillo
,
Jacqueline Andere
,
Ana Martin
,
Cecilia Gabriela
,
Martha Julia
,
Guillermo Garcia Cantu
,
Rene Casados
and
Sabine Moussier
,
La madrastra
tells the story of Maria, a woman who lost twenty years of her life after being falsely accused of murder and who returns to Mexico to exact revenge on her husband and friends who abandoned her and to see her beloved children once more.
La Madrastra
is fourth in a series of remakes of the 1981
Chilean
production of the same name
. The program aired five nights a week, Monday through Friday, at 9 pm for 25 weeks. A follow-up special,
La madrastra: anos despues
, aired shortly after the finale on Saturday, July 30, 2005.
From June 15 to August 21, 2015
Canal de las Estrellas
broadcast reruns 12:00 replacing
Rubi
with
Hasta que el dinero nos separe
replacing it on August 24.
Plot
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A terrible tragedy puts an end to a group of friends' vacation in
Aruba
. Maria hears a gunshot and finds her friend Patricia dead; in the confusion of the moment, she picks up the gun. Maria is thus found guilty of murder and is sentenced to life in jail. Her husband, Esteban, an important businessman, does not believe her proclamations of innocence, and when he returns to Mexico he divorces her, buys the silence of all who were with them on the trip, and tells his young children that their mother died in an accident. He then erects a painting of another woman, whom he names Montserrat, above the fireplace
Twenty years later, Maria is freed from prison as a result of her good conduct and returns to Mexico City in search of vengeance. She wants to find Patricia's real killer and confront Esteban, whom she now hates for abandoning her, but what she wishes for most is to have her children, Hector and Estrella, back. The first thing that Maria does when she arrives is to confront everyone who was with her on the trip: Esteban; Servando, one of Esteban's business associates at the Empresas San Roman; Demetrio, Esteban's corporate lawyer; Daniela, Demetrio's wife and the aunt of Esteban's fiancee, Ana Rosa; Bruno, another of Esteban's business associates; Fabiola, Bruno's wife who is nonetheless in love with Esteban; and Alba and Carmela, Esteban's two aunts. Everyone is horrified to see Maria, and she puts fear and doubt into them when she tells them that she did not kill Patricia, and that the real murderer has lived among them for the past twenty years.
In the course of her investigation, Maria finds a portion of Patricia's diary and learns that her friend was not the good person whom she appeared to be: Patricia knew the secrets and weaknesses of everyone in their group and purposefully made Maria believe that Esteban had made sexual advances toward her. Furthermore, Maria learns that Patricia never loved her own son, Leonel, and Maria resolves to prevent Leonel from learning this terrible truth.
Maria remarries Esteban so that she can win back her children's love; however, Hector and Estrella are unaware that Maria is their real mother and loathe her, believing that Maria has come to usurp the rightful place of their mother, whom they have idealized. Plus, Maria must deal with the intrigues of her former friends, most notably Alba, who secretly harbors an
incestuous
love for her own nephew and hates all of the women who grow close to him, and Fabiola, who was once engaged to Esteban and resents Maria for winning his heart despite her low socioeconomic background.
Maria is also stunned to learn that Esteban has a third child, Angel, whose mother Esteban refuses to name. Angel is a frequently ill and insecure young man, and Maria accepts him immediately and treats him with love, and vice versa. Thanks to Maria's support, Angel grows into a self-confident and optimistic man. Little by little, Maria wins her own children's love without revealing the true ties that unite them. She helps Estrella to mature and leave behind her life as a superficial and capricious youth, and helps her to understand that of her two suitors, Carlos and Greco, it is the latter who truly cares for her. Hector is also immature and arrogant, and Maria helps him to accept responsibility when he falls in love with and impregnates Vivian, Maria's former cellmate.
However, Maria's biggest problem is Esteban. Maria finds herself at a crossroads when she realizes that she still loves her husband, and that he still loves her. Now, with her heart hardened by twenty years of suffering, loneliness, and abandonment, Maria must find the strength to choose between vengeance and forgiveness.
Alternate ending
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Two endings to the novela currently exist: following the original airing in 2005,
La madrastra
had a rerun in 2007 in the 6pm time slot on Televisa. Producer Salvador Mejia Alejandre arranged to reunite most of the cast in order to re-film the ending so that viewers could once again eagerly anticipate discovering the killer's identity. The two versions thus diverge at the point when Esteban is let out of prison after the Aruban authorities discover the killer's identity, though some new scenes were added in earlier episodes. A notable difference is that the first version consists of 120 one-hour episodes, but the second version was compressed into 115. Many scenes from the original broadcast were either edited out or tweaked during the second broadcast, such as the deaths of Ana Rosa, Carlos, Alba, Rebecca, and Servando.
In the original ending, Demetrio is revealed to be Patricia's murderer immediately after he shoots Ana Rosa in the abandoned warehouse; it is also revealed that Demetrio is a
crossdresser
, and that he was able to cast suspicion on his wife, Daniela, because he committed the murders while wearing her clothing and a hairpiece identical to hers. Demetrio is soon seen to be slightly unhinged, and he sets out to murder Esteban, Bruno, Fabiola, and Carmela for having abandoned him after claiming to be his friends. He is ultimately arrested after attempting to kill Maria in the final episode, and he is sent to prison, where it is strongly implied that he is
raped
by the other inmates.
In the alternate ending, the killer is not revealed to the audience until the penultimate episode, at which point Bruno discovers the videotape of Fabiola murdering Patricia. In a fit of insanity, Fabiola stabs Bruno to death and then psychotically runs through the streets of Mexico City, alternately searching for Maria and hiding behind lampposts. She eventually corners Maria in the San Roman home with a gun, but the police arrive and she is arrested and sent to a mental institution. In this version Demetrio has a happy ending in which he is reunited with Angel and Carmela at Alma and Angel's wedding; in the original version Fabiola, too, has a happy ending in which she and Bruno abandon their glamorous personalities and devote themselves to one another.
The alternate ending has only ever aired in Mexico; the 2009 re-run of
La madrastra
on
Telefutura
in the United States used the original ending in which Demetrio is the killer. The DVD set of
La madrastra
, which was released in 2006, also features the Demetrio ending. Furthermore, there exists no alternate version of the follow-up special to the novela,
Anos despues
, for the Fabiola ending; Demetrio is Patricia's killer in this special.
Anos Despues
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A follow-up special to
La madrastra
entitled
La madrastra: anos despues
(English:
The Stepmother: Years Later
) aired on El Canal de las Estrellas on Saturday, July 30, 2005, the day after the series finale. Set ten years after the finale's quintuple wedding, the special portrays the happily reunited San Roman family, including four new grandchildren, as well as the Xochimilco residents (reformed villains Bruno, Fabiola, and Daniela do not appear in the special; Daniela is said to have happily married an older man, while Bruno and Fabiola have devoted themselves to helping sick children). The San Romans go to Patricia's lake cabin in order to celebrate their shared ten-year wedding anniversary, unaware that Demetrio, whom they believe died after escaping from prison a year prior, is actually alive and well and is conspiring with his grandson, Angel and Alma's young son Angelito, and the San Roman grandchildren's nanny, Diana, to kill the entire family. After numerous failed plots to kill his family members, Angelito lures Maria to a shack in the woods where Demetrio is holding Estrella hostage. Esteban comes to their rescue, but while fighting with Demetrio a candle is knocked over and sets the structure on fire, killing Demetrio and Diana. Angelito is left near death after the event, but Maria's prayers to the Virgin Mary save the child, and his grandmother gives him the silver figurine of the Virgin that she made in prison in order to remind him to always be good.
Cast
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Main
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Also main
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Special Performances
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Broadcast history
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La madrastra
premiered on
Televisa
's
El Canal de las Estrellas
(XEW-TV) on Monday, February 7, 2005, at 9:00 PM, replacing
Mujer de madera
. The program aired weeknights at this time for one hour until Friday, July 15, 2005, when the telenovela was originally scheduled to end after a 115-episode run. However, after
La madrastra
became such a ratings success, Televisa ordered an additional ten episodes, bringing the episode total to 125. These final episodes were reduced from the normal hour length to thirty minutes each,
[3]
ceding the latter portion of the hour to
La esposa virgen
. The series finale aired on Friday, July 29, 2005, with the
Anos despues
special airing the following evening. It aired on
Univision
Monday March 21, 2005, 9pm/8c replacing
Amor Real
. The last episode was broadcast Monday September 5, 2005, with
La esposa virgen
replacing it. The novela was then replaced with
La esposa virgen
, which expanded to take up the entire hour. Televisa later re-aired the program, with a new ending, in 2007.
Prior versions
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La madrastra
is a remake and is the fifth version of this telenovela to be broadcast. The four previous versions are:
- La madrastra
(1981), produced by
Canal 13
in Chile, with Jael Unger and Walter Kliche.
- Vivir un poco
(English:
To Live a Little
; 1985), produced by Televisa in Mexico, with
Angelica Aragon
and Rogelio Guerra.
- Para toda la vida
(English:
For All of Life
; 1996), produced by Televisa in Mexico in conjunction with
Megavision
in Chile, with
Ofelia Medina
and Ezequiel Lavandero.
- Forever
(1996), produced by
Fox Television
in the United States in conjunction with Televisa, with Maria Mayenzet and James Richer.
DVD release
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La madrastra
was released to
region 1 DVD
on 21 March 2006. The series was considerably abridged in order to fit on the three double-sided DVD set, which contains 710 minutes of material. In addition to the abridged novela, the release also features the post-finale
Anos despues
special, as well as the original trailer for the novela,
bloopers
, and promotional photographs. The DVD release also has optional English
subtitles
.
In popular culture
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La madrastra
was featured in Mexican sketch comedy show
La Parodia
, which spoofed the program in a parody called
La madre esta
. The character of Maria was portrayed by Gaby Ruffo, younger sister of Victoria Ruffo, who plays Maria in the novela.
The telenovela gained notice in the English-speaking United States in 2005 after being featured on numerous episodes of
E!
network's
The Soup
. Host
Joel McHale
often singled out Bruno for the amount of eyeliner that the character wore and "that bitch Alba" for what McHale described as her "crazy eye" that appeared to bulge noticeably larger than the other during particularly intense scenes.
The Soup
also mocked particular scenes of the novela, such as when Alba poisoned Rebeca with rat poison, causing the latter to flail and foam at the mouth before dramatically dying on the floor. McHale at one point emphatically stated that "I can think of fifteen network shows I
understand
that aren't this good!"
Awards and nominations
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2006 TVyNovelas Awards
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2006 Bravo Awards
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2006 Latin ACE Awards
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2010 TV Adicto Golden Awards
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| Category
|
Recipient
|
Result
|
| Best Remake or Import of the Decade
|
La madrastra
|
Won
|
2020 TLN Awards
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References
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External links
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