For Aislinn Derbez, her new romantic series Entre Paredes (Between Walls), which is now available on Hulu, is the definition of a “comfort show.” Derbez spoke to Remezcla about the romance in the show, her character Marga, and the way Mexico feels like another character in the series.
In Entre Paredes, Marga and Martín (Christian Vázquez) meet on a dating app, unaware that they are neighbors. Once they figure it out, they decide they can’t date, because “one should never date one’s neighbor.” But soon it becomes obvious they really would like to be dating. So, what gives?
“I think it is one of those series that for me is very welcoming, very comfortable, like a Christmas movie that you watch with your family to have fun, to not think so much when you are tired or overwhelmed. It’s the type of show that makes you feel better, that entertains you and that is very light.”
But it’s also a series that showcases love in all its different forms. “I think it is a series that talks a lot about love and about different ways of loving because all the characters are dealing with different types of love. All the neighbors have their own story, their own lives, they are in quite complex situations, and several in very uncomfortable situations as well.”
Perhaps, most importantly, Entre Paredes is a show that feels like it’s set in Mexico and the characters are Mexican. Derbez spoke about the importance of Mexico as a setting, sharing that “it was totally intentional,” and explaining that “We wanted it to feel very Mexican, but a modern Mexico, not a stereotyped Mexico, like the one that you see in the cliché movies, but it was a very real Mexico, as it is really today, which is a very modern Mexico.”
This Mexico is a character both visually and emotionally in many ways. “It feels very Mexican and it feels very Latino, and I think that all Latin American countries have many things in common, and that makes it feel very familiar. And there is nothing more Mexican and more Latino than this coexistence of neighbors, and the drama that suddenly happens between neighbors in this type of place.”
Plus, “we see the locations in the historical center of Mexico, in Bellas Artes, in Alameda, all very iconic points of the city, which are also one more character of the series.”
For Derbez, Mexico is the perfect setting for a story about something she joked wasn’t actually a recipe for disaster. “I feel that being neighbors is the perfect recipe so that you can be almost living together, but in reality, everyone has their own space. It seems super healthy to me! I swear that if I could choose a way to relate to someone, it would be being neighbors. Everyone has their own space, everyone has their own apartment, but we knock on the door and there you are.”
Just like Entre Paredes is. To entertain you. To make you smile. To display different kinds of love. And, of course, to showcase how all of that happens in Mexico—and in Spanish.
Entre Paredes is available on Hulu in the US and Disney Plus in Latin America.
