This week Salvador Illa made a television double feature. He said he didn't want to make a spectacle of his illness, but he made sure his return was well-publicized. On Tuesday, Ariadna Oltra gave him a good institutional interview on TV3. And on Wednesday, on La 2 Cat, Jordi Basté gave him a guided tour of the Palau de la Generalitat. As the presenter himself warned, it was a more human interview. The president's recovery further justified the program's personal tone. Certainly, the time Basté spent asking him about his illness, his hospitalization, and his management of his position during his leave was interesting. But once again, in the Pla seqüència there is so much attention to technical flourish that scriptwriting is neglected. Basté, perhaps too focused on choreography, is on autopilot when asking questions. The script for President Illa's interview was documented from previous interviews. Basté asked the president questions he already knew, and only asked him to confirm the data: "You are a believer...", "We have only seen your wife once...", "You have a daughter...", "Were you born in La Roca?", "Did your family live there?", "Where do you live?", "When did you start in politics?", "Then you move to the Department of Justice, right?", "You lived in Madrid during the pandemic...", "Are you an Espanyol fan...". Even when he asked about his brothers, he asked if they fought, looking for a specific anecdote that the president had already explained publicly in the interview with Ricard Ustrell last year. "Is that about the glasses true?", he asked. Basté knew it very well because Illa himself had already explained the story: when the brothers fought, they would take a truce to take off their glasses to avoid breaking them and having their parents buy new ones.The problem with the script is that there is no question that is well-researched, designed to make the president explain something different and new. And so it is very difficult for an interview to evolve into truly new, personal, and more intimate places. No matter how much they distract you with a guided tour of the Casa dels Canonges or the assistant performs a magic trick, dialogue remains the most important thing. And in Pla seqüència, this is being forgotten. A lot of technical display but little scriptwriting. It's not enough for Basté to ask the questions. The questions cannot be beginner-level. Since the script has no personality or audacity, the answers become highly predictable. A good interview, so-called "human", must know how to lead the interviewee to unexpected places, to reflections they hadn't planned. And this is only achieved with questions that have been thought out to learn something new about the person, not what you would find on Wikipedia. It was evident that Basté knew, more or less, what Illa could answer. And if the interviewer is not surprised, neither is the viewer.

This Thursday night, Jordi Basté premiered his Sequence plan On La 2 Cat, with a guest who undoubtedly served as a draw: Iñaki Urdangarin. From a strictly formal point of view, with a single continuous shot, never stopping the camera, the program is technically ambitious. And a risk that many professionals wouldn't take, because editing can improve the interviews and also improve them as interviewees. On the other hand, the long take requires a lot of rehearsal for the technique to work. And all rehearsal involves a certain theatricality. For example: Basté, at the end of the conversation, regrets having left a book in the car. He even puts his head on the table to express how upsetting it is to have to stop the interview to go and get it. Then, in the subsequent broadcast about the making-ofWe discovered that this supposed "oversight" was planned and rehearsed. In other words, the interview contained a fictional element. Basté claims he was allowed to do so, but that's not true. And this raises doubts about the veracity of everything that happens. Even the guest had choreographed his walk through the dining room to react to the pause. That is to say, the single-shot sequence isn't always a guarantee of transparency. It's also artificial.

Jordi Basté's new program on La 2 Cat, Sequence planThe new program doesn't yet have a premiere date, but it does have its first guest: Iñaki Urdangarin. The former husband of Princess Cristina and former FC Barcelona handball player gives the interview after being released from prison, where he served time for the Nóos case. This is the first time Urdangarin has given a personal interview, away from the sports or institutional spotlight. Over 50 minutes, host Basté will attempt to create an unfiltered portrait of the former son-in-law of the King Emeritus. The goal is to capture real, spontaneous, and natural moments that allow viewers to get to know the guest as he is in his daily life. The program also features appearances by friends, family, and associates who will help to build broader and more human accounts of the interviewees.

This week RTVE's new channel La 2 Cat premiered The second coffee, the current affairs analysis program that airs after the Coffee of ideas by Gemma Nierga. Hence the title. In the end, it's an excess of caffeine, because it offers a morning slot where the content ends up being too similar, the topics are repeated, and the dynamics are alike.