New series 'Gènesi' traces chef Ferran Adriá's rise to culinary icon

Catalan chef Ferran Adrià is widely regarded as one of the most influential chefs in modern culinary history, but on Monday he stepped out of the kitchen and into less familiar territory: the San Sebastian Film Festival.

He was there for the premiere of "Gènesi," a six-part series directed by David Pujol that traces Adrià's rise to the top of the world in gastronomy. Released simultaneously on the 3Cat platform and at the festival, it follows the evolution of Adrià's world-famous restaurant, El Bulli. 

The show follows the arrival of a young, visionary chef at Cala Montjoi on the Costa Brava in the 1980s and the transformation of the beachside restaurant into the most creative gastronomic space on the planet, placing Catalan cuisine at the forefront of the culinary world.

Miquel Fernández is the actor responsible for bringing the chef to the screen and reproducing his characteristic speech. He admits that he was afraid of exaggerating or over-interpreting, but now, with Ferran Adrià's endorsement, he assures the Catalan News Agency (ACN) that he feels proud of his work.

For Adrià, a second season is now essential, since "there are many things left to explain." He says it is important for television to bring Catalonia's gastronomic revolution to the screen.

Director David Pujol, who had previously made several documentaries about El Bulli, said the biographical drama allowed him to explore aspects he hadn't been able to before. 

"There are three words that come up again and again throughout the series," Pujol said. "Excitement, passion and obsession." 

He noted that a dramatization makes it possible to enter "the world of emotions" and lend greater weight to key moments in the restaurant's history. 

Pujol also emphasized the importance of physically recreating El Bulli's world for filming. The series was shot both at the original restaurant and on a set built in Terrassa reproducing its interior.

"That was essential for me," said the director, who wanted to shoot "continuous shots that followed the characters" to give viewers the sense of truly being inside the restaurant. He said the recreation was so faithful that when Adrià and his team visited the set, they experienced "a very nostalgic and beautiful feeling," because "the staging was very authentic."

Albert Adrià played by Carlos Cuevas

Another key figure in the rise of El Bulli is Albert Adrià, played by Carlos Cuevas. The actor noted that the character's arc differs sharply from his brother's. "He is deliberately someone more discreet than Ferran, someone more shy," Cuevas said.

Cuevas explained that Albert Adrià arrived at the restaurant in the late 1980s "without any gastronomic vocation, without interest in being a chef," but was drawn into the profession by the passion of the chefs around him and his brother, eventually becoming "one of the best chefs in the world." 

To build the character, Cuevas chose not to imitate Albert Adrià directly but to "try to embody his spirit," drawing on a line the actor came across in a documentary: "Work and be silent." 

"That's also what I wanted to do, interpretively speaking," Cuevas said. "[To create] an important character, with a perspective and some cooking skill, but who also knew how to listen and observe from behind."

"Gènesi" is a 3Cat series co-produced with Minoria Absoluta and Fishcorb Media. It will be distributed in the rest of Spain, Europe, Latin America and the United States through Netflix.