The Galician director, screenwriter and producer by Mr. Fischer). And he has counted on none other than Woody Allen to provide the voice-over for a seven-minute story focused on the surreal anecdote that occurred in the 1972 World Chess Championship, which faced Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky. in Reykjavík.
The Soviets then accused the American team of manipulating Fischer's chair so that it would harm, through radiation or contaminating substances, the mind and performance of the world champion. Which led the Icelandic Chess Federation to stop the competition and examine the chair for a thorough analysis.
A great admirer of the New York filmmaker, he thought of him "naturally" to tell a story "from a new point of view." In 2021 he had the idea of making a feature-length animation about the world of chess "type Queen's Gambit", but to finance it - since he was going to do it with a computer - he and Lorenzo proposed making a short film. He wrote the script for Mr. Fischer's Chair, which has a comedic edge, and needed a narrator. "The first thing in animation is to record the voices and when I was thinking Woody Allen came to mind for several reasons. First, because I have about 25 DVDs with his films and his humor can be seen in the way I wrote the script. Second, because he "He is a great lover of chess and shows it in his filmography; and third, he was the figure of Fischer himself, a Jewish boy from Brooklyn who became a myth, just like Allen."
So Zapata began to send the project by email, very excited, to Helen Robin, the Manhattan director's right-hand woman, who at that time was filming her latest film, Coup de Luck, in Paris. Robin replied that it would be very difficult because they receive tons of projects, but two weeks later she responded that Allen was interested and that he should tell her the conditions. "I was so shocked that I didn't respond for two weeks, because I didn't know what to respond; how to face his yes," Zapata confesses with a laugh.
Another two weeks later Robin contacted him again to find out what was happening and then "I got up the courage to explain to him that I am a short filmmaker, that I have no money and the means of production are scarce for animation. Come on, I told him that he did. left me baffled." Helen responded that she appreciated her sincerity, but that without money or a project in place it was going to be complicated. Zapata saw the project lost, but to his surprise "two or three weeks later they told me that Woody wants to do it regardless of the conditions."
The Galician director believes that the reason why he accepted the American is "because I connected with his universe through the project." Allen has even been involved in the production of the short itself. "It is something very impressive because this man, who does not participate in other people's work or collaborate, has valued the project and has proven to be a professional. He has gotten involved in something that he could not have risked doing, because I am nobody," comments Zapata. Of course, Allen's circle "did a little checkup on me to find out who he was and what he wanted to do with the short."
The long-awaited meeting took place in New York at the beginning of this year. "The treatment with him has been spectacular. We recorded in his private studio and in an hour it was ready. He knew the script by heart! and I was quite amazed to see so much professionalism in a man who does not need it. This experience has no price and far surpasses any award. And it gives me a human perspective of Allen, an excellent person, a serious and professional man who greatly respects the work of others," he explains proudly. And he compares it to the performance of Colm Meaney, who provided his voice in The Monkey: "He came to the recording and learned the script there and did it magnificently, but he hadn't read it before."
The production of Mr. Fischer's Chair has been delayed because Zapata was commissioned to premiere the short film Avetimología-Birdtymology next month in Brussels by Spain's European presidency. "Now I will focus on the short, which we hope to release at the end of 2024." In parallel, he is preparing the animated feature film focused on Bobby Fischer's childhood The Game of the Century, which was presented to investors at the 2022 Cartoon Movie in France, and which is in its writing and financing phase.
Zapata says that Allen is supervising the entire process and that he has modified the sign: "We put his name in large letters and he has reduced them. Quite the opposite of what you can imagine!" For his meeting with the legendary filmmaker, he made a t-shirt with the title 'How to End Chess', the name of one of the stories that Allen published in his first book How to End Culture and concludes that in life "anything is possible." Yes, everything has its way", aware that with the collaboration of the director of Annie Hall he has been lucky, "but it is also the result of work and a career. Without the Goya I would not be here."
