‘There’s a great love of life amid the sadness and hardships in the lives of the foreign workers here,” says Yohanan (Jorge) Weller, the director of the film, Salsa Tel Aviv, which opened recently throughout Israel.
“But I love comedies, and I decided to tell their story as a comedy. I could have made a tragedy, a film that says their lives are horrible, Israelis are horrible.
But I took my cue from the optimism I found among them as I did my research.”
The film tells the story of Vicky, a young single mother from Mexico who
comes to Israel to reconnect with the father of her son, who is working
as a salsa instructor here, and to earn money to send home to her
family.
To have an easier time getting into the country, Vicky disguises herself
as a nun, and meets and befriends a Spanish-speaking Israeli biologist,
Yoni, on the plane. Yoni is engaged to be married to a very proper
young Israeli woman, but an unlikely attraction begins between Vicky and
Yoni, as a series of typical romantic-comedy style coincidences keep
bringing them back together.
Vicky is played by the Mexican actress, Angelica Vale.
“We decided to make the character Mexican [rather than from a different
Spanish-speaking country] because of Angelica,” says Argentina-born
Weller, who has been living in Israeli for half his life. Vale is “a
very popular comic actress in Mexico, she starred in Ugly Betty on TV
there, and it was shown also on Spanish- speaking stations in the US, so
she has quite a following. She has done dramas, too. I had no idea
whether she would want to do a low-budget film like this, but she loved
the script and she really wanted to play this part.
Her grandfather was Jewish, so she feels she has a mystical connection to the Jewish people.”
SHE ALSO persuaded her mother, Angelica Maria, an actress who in her
younger days was known as the Sandra Dee of Mexico, to take the small
role of her mother in the film.
The hunky nerd who falls for the salsa-dancing nun is played by
Uruguay-born Angel Bonani, an Israeli model and heartthrob who is making
the transition to acting.
“Cary Grant was the model for this kind of character,” says Weller.
“I saw a lot of the classic romantic comedies with Cary Grant again in
recent years and I had that image of him in mind when we were making
this.”
As Weller researched the lives of foreign workers here, along with his
screenwriter, Elisa Dor, they found fascinating stories that inspired
the story.
“For a lot of these workers, the salsa club is the focus of their
community. They go there every week, it gives them energy. . . We met a
woman from Colombia, who had three children she left behind at home that
she was supporting. And her boyfriend was an Israeli cop. He loved
salsa, and they met at the club. They’d fight, and he’d say, ‘I’ll have
you deported.’ ” The idea to have Vicky disguise herself as a nun to get
into Israel was also based on a true story.
Reflecting on the many dramas in the workers’ lives he discovered, he
says, “It’s true that they are here illegally, but they are not
criminals. They are doing whatever they can to support their families. .
. A state must have mercy. I’m glad that in the film you get to see all
different sides of them.”
Weller is optimistic about the potential for this multi-cultural film to cross borders.
“It will come out in Mexico, it’s being shown here, it will also appeal
to American Jews and anyone who likes a good romantic comedy. . . It is
possible to make a comedy about a serious subject.”