‘The Beasts’ Producer Caballo Films Sets Series Adaptation of ‘El Proxeneta,’ Directed by Pilar Palomero (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent High-flying Madrid-based Caballo Films, behind Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The Beasts” and “Riot Police” and Borja Soler’s “The Route,” has put into development a fiction series adaptation of Mabel Lozano’s prized same-titled non-fiction work.

Shaping up as a deep drill-down into the growth of prostitution in Spain into large-scale organized crime, “El Proxeneta” packs a powerful talent package of creator-writers Isabel Peña, co-writer of Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “As Bestas” and “Riot Police,” and Eduardo Villanueva, a co-scribe on “Riot Police” and producer on “Stockholm.”  Pilar Palomero, a Spanish Academy Goya best picture winner for “Schoolgirls,” will direct the series, her first TV work beyond one episode of “Venga Juan.” “Pilar was always on our minds for this project, given her talent, and we wanted a female gaze behind all the key points of creative responsibility,” said Villanueva. “El Proxeneta” is co-produced by Lozano’s label Mafalda Entertainment.  “My commitment and activism against sexual slavery is above my work as a filmmaker and writer,” Lozano told Variety.  “I didn’t want to sell the rights to my book and for an adaptation to whitewash procurers, converting delinquents into idols.

So it was vital to be in all the process, both creation and production. Caballo offered me that and are, undoubtedly, the best travel companions I could have.” Published in 2018 by Editorial Alrevés in Spain, “El Proxeneta” won the prestigious Rodolfo Walsh Award for best non-fiction book, and has gone through eight editions.

Also published in Mexico and Colombia by Editorial Planeta, it turns on the first-person testimony of an ex-prostitution kingpin, nicknamed El Músico.