Casanova shoots Spanish series featuring HIV-positive vampires

Casanova films HIV-positive vampires with inclusive language

Eduardo Casanova, known for his role in Aída and now a prominent figure in subsidized Spanish cinema, is preparing a series titled Silencio: a story about vampires living with HIV who use inclusive language. The announcement, made via social media, has peine the perennial debate: who pays for this and why?

The response was swift. Within hours, the conversation shifted to one main point: public money. Not the script, the cast, or quality, but the bill.

Who funds the HIV vampire series?

On paper, the production lists support from the European Union through the Creative Europe MEDIA program, according to data tracked during the discussion. This implies EU funding but does not confirm grants from Spanish administrations, a nuance often lost in heated exchanges.

Alongside this EU channel appears Apoyo Positivo, an NGO declared of public utility, linked to the project. This combination—EU funds plus civil society networks—illustrates the typical model of certain Spanish cinema: projects that do not need box office success to exist because their viability is decided before release.

This is the core of the anger. It is not the theme. As one repeated comment summarizes, if a private entity pays, they can do what they want with their money, but if the taxpayer pays, things change.

How much does it cost and who pays?

The question running through the conversation is uncomfortably simple: how much will it cost us? Because, it is argued, these whims are not cheap. Here appears the precedent cited by many: the director’s previous work, which allegedly earned a fraction of its production budget and left cinemas after the first weekend.

That calculation, repeated with varying figures depending on the source, serves as argumentative ammunition. Others say the industry defends itself: without subsidies, much of national production would disappear. The counterargument is that this dependency keeps alive a structure that should be renewed and excludes those who actually fill theaters.

Some go further, arguing the problem is not the amount, but the discretionary allocation: the same names, producers, and circuits. And a recurring detail: if almost no one sees the result, the subsidy has already served its purpose.

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The creative angle: vampires, HIV, and inclusive language

Beyond the money, the project has triggered another debate, the cultural one. Some recall that Jesús Franco was already shooting lesbian vampire movies in the seventies, with smaller budgets and, according to many, better taste. Transgression, they say, has become ugly; and if evil is shown as it is, it seduces no one.

Another current reads the issue in terms of the era. The combination of vampires, serological diagnosis, and inclusive vocabulary is interpreted as a perfect synthesis of cinema funded by identity criteria rather than commercial ones. They insist it is not a critique of the content, but of the mechanism that makes it possible.

And a third, minority but present view argues that public money exists precisely for what the market would not touch. At this point, the discussion stops being about the series and becomes about the model.

What is said about the director and his career?

Casanova’s figure concentrates much of the noise. He is remembered as the child who played a disturbed character in Aída, and speculation arises, without proof, that this role marked his later career. This is the type of reasoning circulating more frequently than data these days.

It is also repeated that his filmography relies on connections rather than box office results. This is an assertion launched without documentation and should be treated as what it is: a widespread opinion, not an established fact.

The truth is that his name acts as a magnet. Each new project reactivates the same circuit: announcement, indignation, search for budget lines, and start again.

The pattern that repeats every season

The sequence is almost mechanical. First comes the striking announcement. Then, the question about funding. Next, the tally of failed precedents. Finally, the realization that nothing changes: the project is filmed, released in limited circulation, and the subsidy is already collected.

What has changed is the tone. Years ago, these discussions ended with a shrug. Now they end with a figure: half of that subsidy, it is claimed, would suffice to shoot something that earns fifty times more.

It may be exaggerated. It may not be. What is fruta is that the model remains intact and no one has found a way to stop it from making headlines.