“It's the worst job I've ever had.” A show employeeHippie heavenby Nacho Cano defines how he experienced his time in the musical that has been on show at the Pereyra Theater in Ibiza since May last year. Adinner showwhich promises to reveal “the history” of the island “in a fun way”, conceived by the musician and producer who was arrested last week for alleged irregularities in the hiring of his musicalMalinché.
The person who filed the complaint was Leslie Guadalupe. A 28-year-old dancer who was part of the group of 19 young Mexicans that Cano, as he explained, brought as “scholars” to train and bring the work to their country. “I grew up listening to Mecano's songs, I admired him a lot. “It was a great production, what bad could happen?”, the Mexican told elDiario.es about the expectations with which she arrived in Madrid last December. He already had experience with productions related to the Madrid musician. He had participated in the version of Today I can't get up which Nacho Cano developed in Mexico.
“They told us we would stay between ten months and a year. I've worked on large, small and medium-sized productions. They rehearse for two to three months. It was stupid that they used to spend so much time on us,” he now judges of the program they were offered. “We rehearsed from Monday to Friday, sometimes on Saturdays. They paid us 300 euros a month out of hand. Breakfast and dinner were on our account and at the weekend we got ten euros for meals,” he says.
His routine consisted of “going to the gym at 6:30 in the morning and rehearsing from nine to six in the afternoon. Some days we'd sing afterward.” Schedules outside of the usual workday were also common in the rest of the musicals. In Hippie heaven They lasted from “two in the afternoon to three in the morning,” one of the collaborators, who preferred to remain anonymous, told elDiario.es. This collaborator is from Canada. Two weeks before he left for the trip, he received the message that he had been accepted. He packed his bags and flew to Spain in January. The time of the sessions was not reduced once the show began to be performed, whose premiere on May 18 was attended by the president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso.
Regarding his working conditions, the worker explains that they told him that “if they give you room and board, they can make you work as many hours as they want.” “Everyone told me the same thing, so I signed the contract, which said I would work a maximum of 40 hours a week,” he points out the requirements included in the agreement to which he had access and was able to verify this medium, along with the rest of the documents from the sources that prove their connection with the different shows.
The dynamic that had once emerged within the Ibiza production surprised him negatively. First of all, because the script of the play and the staging were 'not finished yet'. “It seemed strange to me, why did I have to come so soon?” he wondered. The problem became bigger when he discovered that he had to “share a room with six other people. “I said I would share a house, but not a room.” They stayed in those conditions for two months, before being moved to another location, closer to the theatre.
For Lesly, the accommodation provided to attend the event was also a surprise. Malinché in Madrid. “They put us up in a hostel. Eight companions slept in one room. I was lucky because I got one of the four. We had one refrigerator for 19 people,” she explains about the period that was eventually reduced to “two weeks”, since she was “expelled from the program”.
They had put us in a hostel. Eight companions slept in one room. I was lucky because I got one of the four. We had only one refrigerator for 19 people.
Leslie Guadalupe
— Dancer
To the employee of Hippie heaven They fired him “overnight” at the end of June, “without any explanation” and gave him “three days’ notice” to leave his job and the “house” he was living in. “We are not interested in working with you any longer,” was the only justification he was given, according to what he told this newspaper. “I had nowhere to go,” says the Canadian. He was saved by being able to return to Madrid and stay at his sister’s house before heading to Berlin, where he is currently staying.
“Anyone who didn't accept it, they threw them out on the fucking street.”
“If you want, we can talk about food. I’ve never seen anything worse,” says the Canadian, who points out that pasta and lasagna were the two regular dishes, along with “paella and sometimes a hamburger that they gave you without bread.” He decided to eat himself. The menu was no better, either. Malinchéwhere Edwin Ortiz worked as a lighting technician in the first season, which premiered on September 15, 2022. “As the days went by, it got worse to the point where everything was already very bad pasta and salads. It didn't change. “They were constantly repeating foods that were not healthy,” he criticizes this newspaper.
“There was a time when the catering disappeared, they didn't tell us why. The same thing happened with the heating, there were days when it was very cold,” says violinist Delaney Stockli, who also helped launch Malinchéfrom September 2022 to April 2023. “I decided to leave. The atmosphere between production and workers seemed too dramatic to me,” he describes to elDiario.es.
“There was a culture where you either did your best without conditions or you weren’t part of the ‘family’. That was the speech they gave us. They really believed in the concept of family when it suited them. And when it didn’t, it was the jungle. I believe in workers’ rights and this is something I didn’t feel comfortable with,” she explains of the dynamic that prevailed in the show: “When we musicians went to talk to Nacho or the production, they told us that to be grateful, if they wanted to, they could fire the whole cast and tomorrow they would find another hundred who would want to work here right away.
There was a culture where you either did your best without any strings attached or you weren't part of the 'family'. It was the speech they gave us. They believed very much in the concept of family when it suited them. And when it didn't, it was the jungle.
Delaney Stockli
— Violinist
The “hours above” what they had signed in the contract were the violinist’s main complaint. “When we said it openly, they didn’t like it at all. There were immediate consequences. I felt like they were taking advantage of our time and good will,” he says. “Anyone who didn’t accept it, they threw them out on the fucking street,” the lighting technician echoes. “There were long hours of work, bad food, bad rest, bad transportation, and always with the threat that if you said anything, they would kick you out,” he adds.
Edwin Ortiz adds as a reproach the transport management to get to and from Ifema, the location in Madrid Malinché remains represented. “We worked ten to fifteen hours a day. We came home at two in the morning and at eight you had to get up at ten to go to rehearsals,” he explains. “When we left late, there was no public transportation anymore. We had to take taxis and they didn’t pay for that. The first fifteen days I spent almost a quarter of my salary that way. The producer wasn’t responsible. They told you, ‘Get a life!’”
A post show without prior notice
The worker of Hippie heaven He claims that, without contractual notice, he was forced to extend his hours at a concert after the piece. “He told me overnight that I had to learn another 15 songs for a show that no one had told me about, and for 133 euros a day, which is an absolute pittance,” the employee reproaches. “In my life, I have never experienced anything so ridiculous and I would even say exploitative. It is the worst job I have ever had,” he says. “I don’t understand how people can be so inefficient. Working with Nacho Cano is like working for a tyrant who yells at you all day to do something,” he says.
I have never experienced anything so ridiculous and I would even say exploitative in my life. It is the worst job I have ever had. Working with Nacho Cano is like working for a tyrant who yells at you all day to do something
A 'Hippie Heaven' worker
This practice is similar to the one Cano suggested to the young Mexicans he brought to Madrid to become “scholars” in the field of Malinché. According to what they told El País, during the performance of the musical they worked as waiters in the 'Canalla' bar if they wanted to earn more money than the agreed 300 per week.
“Play with people's illusions”
Edwin Ortiz explained that when he ran for office Malinchéthey were looking for table technicians, gunners and stage musicians. “The offer never said that you had to move from one position to another, because the responsibilities and salaries are different. There, everyone was paid the same. And I was against the fact that they sent me from one place to another,” he says. He also claims that there was a lack of control over the timetables. “You wrote down the overtime, but because there was no registration, they then paid you whatever they wanted,” he judges. They fired him after eight months for ‘disciplinary dismissal’. “I appealed and managed to have it declared inadmissible,” he adds.
“There was overexploitation. “They are real robbers,” he says. The coach believes that “they play a lot with the illusions of people, who are afraid to say things that could harm them.” “Fame is abused,” he says of the “arrogance” with which production teams are treated “because it’s Nacho Cano and if you don’t work with him, you won’t work with anyone. If you complain to them, they will make your life miserable with other companies.” “That an artist with pretensions of greatness has all this based on the fact that people are almost giving the work away is not fair. They take advantage of that a lot,” he concludes.
This medium has contacted Nacho Cano, who did not want to make a statement. The Pereyra Theater in Ibiza, where it is performed Hippie heaven He also did not want to respond to questions from elDiario.es.
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