Imanol Arias He plays it at 68 years old. The most famous actor in Spain and one of those who has earned the most money, after 23 seasons as the protagonist of Cuéntame, is living some crazy days faced with the dilemma of his life, worse than the nightmares that his character, Antonio Alcántara, suffered in the more than two decades that accompanied the Spanish in prime time on 1.
The Leonese actor of Basque origin is trying to reach an agreement with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office to avoid prison for an alleged tax crime: this implies pleading guilty to minimize the consequences of the possible conviction. Only in this way could Imanol Arias ensure that he avoids jail after it was published that he had reached an agreement with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office. The husband in Mercedes Alcántara’s fiction would plead guilty to some of the tax crimes attributed to him in exchange for a reduced sentence in which the prison sentence is not contemplated.
Ana Duato will face 31 years in prison and a 12 million fine
The details of the pact are still being finalized, which has not been signed, but the actor’s race against the clock is entering its final days. The trial is scheduled to begin on June 4. Initially, according to Eldiario.es, Imanol He faces a sentence of 27 years in prison and a fine of 10 million euros for crimes against the Public Treasury.
Ana Duato, his partner in the TVE series, has not wanted to reach an agreement with the Prosecutor’s Office and will face a sentence of 31 years in prison and a fine of 12 million euros. The actress, who turns 56 in three weeks, maintains her innocence and maintains that the accusations against her contain demonstrable errors that will achieve her acquittal.
The end of Cuéntame
In October, TVE premiered the final season of Tell me, the longest-running series on television, which came to an end after 22 years on the grid. It began in 2001 and at the end of 2023 the seven chapters that ended production were completed. They began the final story in 1994, when the PSOE of Felipe González, now so topical thanks to his criticisms against Zapatero and Pedro Sánchez, he was giving his last blows, and ended up with José María Aznar in full absolute majority.
TVE authorized the last season of Tell me after many doubts about how to close such an important fiction. The option of leaving the series unfinished never crossed Imanol Arias’ mind. “I never thought about it, I always trusted,” said the actor, who has played Antonio Alcántara for more than two decades. “It wouldn’t have been fair,” pointed out Irene Visedo (Inés). “TVE has always treated us very well,” commented Ana Duato (Merche).
“The important thing was to achieve the milestone of closing 23 years. We had to do something that lived up to it, because it is television history,” explained Arias. “You had to meet the public,” she added. “The great protagonists of the series are the viewers,” his wife in the series stated in this same sense.
Although Tell me is a classic television series, the series said goodbye to viewers by ‘innovating’ on its broadcast day, because for the first time it was seen on Wednesday nights and not on Thursday nights, so it was not confronted with GH. “That era of television is over,” said Arias, aware that audiences are very fragmented and everything has changed with the arrival of platforms and time-shifted consumption. “We are leaving at a crucial moment, because there shouldn’t be much left before the television fiction format changes completely. It doesn’t matter if it’s Wednesday or Thursday. The people who watch Tell me has a great commitment,” analyzed Irene Visedo.
‘Cuéntame’, the last great series: “They yelled at me in the street for cheating on Mercedes”
Tell me It has been the last great series on linear television and has lasted even in the era of streaming. He belonged to a golden age that gave great titles, such as The Serranos, No One Lives Here, Águila Roja, Velvet…It also holds The one that is comingYes, but the comedy has also changed its form of programming and is broadcast online before moving to free-to-air television.
In this sense, Tell me It was the last great example of those series that managed to bring together the entire family with an intergenerational audience whose plots affected and affected all its viewers. What happened to the Alcántaras used to be a national debate. It happened when the scriptwriters decided to break up that marriage. “We didn’t believe it,” Duato recalled. “You are going to destroy the series,” Imanol told those responsible for the series. That was a trauma for his audience and the actor confirmed it firsthand one day when he was in Valencia witnessing the mascletá in Las Fallas. “They yelled at me in the street for cheating on Mercedes,” he recalls, laughing.
Less laughter now in real life for both Imanol and Ana Duato. Not even in the worst nightmares devised by the magnificent scriptwriters who weaved the history of Spain with that of the Alcántara did they come up with an ending that could nevertheless come in real life if the worst omens came true: that both Antonio and Mercedes, Imanol and Ana, their days will end in jail for robbing the people whose experiences they were in charge of telling.
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