What sort of role did Guillermo del Toro act out as producer?
JAB: I met Guillermo, like, 15 years ago. I used to say “50.” [Laughs.] People say, “No, no, you’re not 50.” We had a very funny meeting. I was very young, more or less like you. SS: No, a lot less than you. [Laughs.] JAB: I was 15 at the time, I was a minor. I went to a festival pretending to work as a journalist to get free tickets and interview people I really admired. I remember one of these people was Guillermo del Toro. When he saw me for the first time he thought I was a 10-year-old boy with sideburns, [but] he was impressed by my questions so we kept in touch. He came to Spain to shoot a movie and I went to film school and I shot a lot of stuff, different stuff like music videos, short films. And he really liked them. Since he knew I was going to do a movie he wanted to be there, to protect us. So he never, for example, insisted on an idea more than once. He gave a few suggestions. We took some and rejected others. He was there just to help us. He would remind us of experiences
