TELENOVELA WATCH: LA MADAME, SECRETOS DEL PARAISO & QUE BONITO AMOR Finale. Plus, Univision Afternoon Novelas & CORAZON INDOMABLE

Alicia Machado stars in LA MADAME.
Photo Credit: Felipe Cuevas/Univision.com

LA MADAME (Mondays-Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on UniMás) is surprisingly cheeky and funny given its potentially exploitative subject: the lives of high-end escorts. Danger and violence often crop up, but the tone remains largely fanciful. The episodes are a hybrid of serial and stand-alone storytelling. Each episode begins and ends with scenes lasting a total of about ten minutes from the overarching, serialized frame story: the Madame (Alicia Machado) running Colombia’s most exclusive and expensive escort service is kept prisoner in the house of a gangster (Roberto Mateos) who orders her to tell him about each of the girls who works for her. In between the opening and concluding scenes of the frame story is a long central flashback detailing the exploits of one of the Madame’s girls. There is a new girl featured every night with a new guest cast suggesting an anthology series, except the guest lady of the night invariably gets into some predicament that requires the Madame to come to her assistance, accompanied by her bumbling assistant Pacho (Julio Sánchez Cóccaro).

TELENOVELA WATCH: CORAZÓN INDOMABLE Premieres Tonight; Plus, Thoughts on EL SEÑOR DE LOS CIELOS and QUÉ BONITO AMOR

The Televisa production CORAZÓN INDOMABLE premieres tonight at 7 p.m. ET on Univision. Produced by Nathalie Lartilleux (RAFAELA, MAR DE AMOR), CORAZÓN INDOMABLE is a remake of a story already done a half dozen times – probably most famously as MARIMAR in 1994 starring Thalía. This version stars Ana Brenda Contreras, fresh off the success of LA QUE NO PODÍA AMAR, and Daniel Arenas. Also starring Elizabeth Álvarez, René Strickler, César Évora, Ana Patricia Rojo and the comedian movie actress María Elena Velasco – La India María.