Natalia Mateo

Natalia Mateo (Cuenca, 1975) has always had close ties to the world of short film, as much for her work as an actress as her directing and screenwriting. Her fervent contributions to short film were rewarded in 2010 when she won the 1st Prize for Outstanding Short Filmmaker at the Festival “Cortos con Ñ”.

Trained at Cristina Rota School of Acting, her first role came under the direction of David Planell, who featured her and her future battle companion, Marta Aledo in the film Carisma. Her performance as Paca earned her awards for Best Actress at several festivals.

Following continuous appearances in short films under such directors as Daniel Sánchez Arévalo and Toni Bestard, she tried her hand at television with the character Amparo Balaguer in Amar en tiempos revueltos, her most important role on the small screen. There she gained popularity with the public, leading up to her finally landing a role on the big screen with Azuloscurocasinegro. She continued to make short appearances in feature films until she got her first starring role in La Vergüenza (2009), a film helmed by the director who first discovered her, David Planell.

Her extensive acting experience allowed her to make the leap into directing in 2007 with Test, a short film co-directed and co-written alongside Marta Aledo. In 2010 she took the Best Screenplay Award for ¡Qué divertido!, though it wasn’t until 2012 that her work behind the camera was recognized with GOYA nomination for Best Fiction Short Film for Ojos que no ven, which she both directed and wrote.

Natalia Mateo has also lent her talent to the theater with such gems as La Caja Superdeluxe, a play she wrote, directed and acted in, and more recently La casa de enfrente, which she co-directed with Marta Aledo.

Marta Aledo

Marta Aledo (Madrid, 1975) studied Sound and Image at the Complutense University of Madrid and rounded out her training through several courses in dancing and acting.

Her first foray into acting came with Al Salir de Clase and continued with sporadic appearances in prime time Spanish TV series. She managed to fit some theater work into her tight schedule as well, such as Muelle Oeste and S.O.S., and then her first work on the big screen came with Airbag, by Juanma Bajo Ulloa.

Marta Aledo continued broadening her horizons with her short film debut in David Planell’s Carisma, which marked the beginning of an important short film career, under the direction of such filmmakers as León Siminiani. Thanks to Planell, she earned her first awards for Best Actress at several Spanish film festivals. In 2007 she began working behind the camera for the first time, directing Test alongside her longtime collaborator Natalia Mateo.

Her film career then really took off with roles in such powerful projects as Princesas and Las 13 rosas, for which she earned enough acclaim to land roles under Pedro Almodóvar for the short film La consejala antropófaga and the feature film Los abrazos rotos, nominated at Cannes, the Golden Globes and the BAFTA awards.

Marta Aledo has recently become a familiar face in the world of short films and has established herself on television through small roles on major series like Los Serrano and Hospital Central. She is also currently appearing in the successful adventure series Águila Roja on Spanish Public Television.

Some of her most notable theater work includes El mal de la juventud directed by Andrés Lima, Incrementum by Sergio Peris-Mencheta, and Las cuñadas by Natalia Menéndez