Among this year’s Oscar nominees for best original song are two Spanish-language tracks from Emilia Pérez: “El Mal” and “Mi Camino.” The Academy has long had a fascination with songs with a Latin flair, dating back to the category’s first year, 1934, when “Carioca” from Flying Down to Rio was nominated. However, that song — notable for backing Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire’s first shared dance onscreen — didn’t feature Spanish lyrics.
Spanish speakers would wait until the new millennium to be represented in the category: when “Al Otro Lado del Río” (“On the Other Side of the River”), from Focus Features’ The Motorcycle Diaries, won in 2005. The film directed by Walter Salles (whose latest, I’m Still Here, is up for three Oscars this year) is based primarily on Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara’s memoir, in which he and Alberto Granado set off across South America on a Norton 500 motorcycle.
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Uruguayan singer-songwriter Jorge Drexler told THR at the time, “[Salles] sent me a script and didn’t say a word [about what kind of song he wanted]. I chose the subject, and I chose the tempo, rhythm, the tone … the next morning, I emailed the MP3 to Walter; that take made its way to the final cut.”
Drexler was not deemed famous enough to perform his song onstage at the Oscars, however; for that task, Antonio Banderas and Carlos Santana were recruited. But the songwriter was not to be denied: When Prince presented him with the award, Drexler sang a few bars a cappella, then closed his acceptance with a simple, “Ciao, gracias.”
This story first appeared in a February stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
