Univision creates telenovela experiment — a webnovela about U.S. Latinos

LatinaLista — Remember a few years ago when the mainstream television networks wanted to capitalize on the popularity of telenovelas? They created their own telenovelas and even developed a dedicated channel, MyNetworkTV, to telenovelas.
What happened? They all flopped.

It quickly became clear that telenovelas were best left to those who know how to create them. Well, Univision, who doesn’t create their own original telenovelas, is embarking on their own telenovela experiment — a webnovela.
This Wednesday, August 12, is the debut of Univision’s Vidas Cruzadas.
Starring two popular telenovela stars, Kate del Castillo (La Misma Luna/Under the Same Moon) and Guy Ecker, the webnovela is the second webnovela from Univision. It’s about the story of Mariana (Kate del Castillo), an independent woman, who is disillusioned with love after several failed relationships and decides to become a mother through artificial insemination. What she doesn’t count on is her “Prince Charming” crossing her path and how he will change her life.
What is interesting about this project is that while telenovelas are always about the Latino life experience south of the border and entail the stereotypical storyline of poor girl meets rich man who rescues her, amid tears, angst and evil villain, this webnovela promises to reflect the life of Latinos in this country where exists another type of drama.
The 15 episodes will last 3-5 minutes.
Knowing that the internet is the future of television, the production team has also created sites on Facebook and Twitter.
Unfortunately, if you’re not Spanish-proficient, you may not entirely understand the dialogue. Too bad with all this technology that someone doesn’t invent a simultaneous audio translator!
Then all Latinos can enjoy a bit of “culture tv.”