Magdalena Tsanis
Madrid (EFE) Commissioner Villarejo and one of the richest families in Spain.
The docuseries “The Curse of Windsor”, a work by Jordi Évole’s production company, Producciones del Barrio, which premieres this Sunday simultaneously on the TDT channel DMAX and the HBO Max platform, tries to shed light on the case and invites the spectator to put on the detective suit.
“The case had all the necessary ingredients to build a spectacular story,” Víctor Morillo, executive producer and head of development of the series, told EFE: “You could speak from an alleged banking conspiracy to ‘Los bingueros’ by Pajares and Esteso” .
This last aspect is possibly the most unknown and is that the Reyzábal family, owners of the Windsor Tower, was also the founder of Ízaro Films, producer of that Iberian blockbuster, and owner of numerous cinemas, nightclubs and offices in Madrid de the 70s and 80s.
Throughout four episodes, the series examines each of the suspicious elements that came to light and gave rise to all kinds of speculation, from the blue flames given off by the fire to the low pressure of the water that made it difficult for the the firefighters, going through a butron that was found and the shadows of people inside the burning building recorded by an amateur video.
All of this topped off, in 2019, by the leak of some documents that linked the fire with an alleged assignment to former commissioner José Manuel Villarejo to destroy compromising evidence for the former BBVA president Francisco González regarding his management at the company FG Valores.
“When you are investigating, you think you have some certainties, but you go looking for them and you find other things,” says Raül Calabria, director and screenwriter, who especially values the testimony of the two experts who appear in the documentary, one from the insurer and another from the family.
“They are the great protagonists because they do, we would say, the autopsy of the corpse and they provide you with data,” he emphasizes.
The firefighters, the architects of the building, the then mayor of Madrid, Alberto Ruiz Gallardón, and journalists who have investigated the case, from Gabriela Cañas (president of EFE and author of the novel “Torres de fuego”) to José Antonio Hernández, also participate. (former head of investigation at El País), Ruth Ugalde (El Confidencial), José Antonio Masegosa (Telemadrid) or Marta González Novo (Cadena SER).
Despite the fact that the Investigating Court number 28 of Madrid filed the case on January 31, 2006, accepting as good the theory that the origin of the fire was a poorly extinguished cigarette butt in an office of the Deloitte company, the creators of the series claim the right to continue investigating due to the doubts that remained in the air and that accumulated over the years.
“When there are no certainties, speculation makes its way, this is human and legitimate,” says Calabria, seconded by Morillo, who also produced “Operation Palace” (2014), a false documentary about 23F broadcast on the “Salvados” program. by Jordi Evole.
In the documentary they allude to a philosophical principle known as “Ockham’s razor” or principle of parsimony, according to which, other things being equal, the simplest explanation is usually the most probable and they try to apply it to the Windsor case.
“The reality is that the official version, that of the butt in the trash can, is very improbable, by mere statistical calculation, it is easier to burn the building on purpose than for that to happen,” says Morillo.
The focus of the series oscillates between the detective game -something they have allowed themselves, they say, since there were no fatalities- and the reflection on how myths and legends are configured in popular culture.
