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Jump to full article: The Guardian (uk), 2006-07-15
Intro: Where could possibly double for 50s Cuba, the island Andy Garcia left as a child and the subject of his latest film? . . .
'When I decided to direct, the story of Havana was the story I felt compelled to tell," said Andy Garcia, through a curl of Cuban cigar smoke. . . .
The fruit of Garcia's childhood eccentricity is The Lost City, a luxurious snapshot of 50s Havana set against the outbreak of revolution . . .
it was a non-Cuban friend, Carlos Fuentes Junior (of Dominican Republic's Fuentes cigar concern) who solved Garcia's main production problem - the choice of location. . . .
says Garcia. "But the Dominican Republic had everything: tobacco fields, the colonial palace, sugar cane, and a musical pulse similar to Cuba's. And Carlos offered to plant a couple of fields of wrapper-leaf tobacco off-season, too, which meant we could shoot everything at once, as well as getting in some great cigars for the wrap party." . . .
After a hard day of filming, Garcia would unwind in the bar of the Santo Domingo's Renaissance Jaragua Hotel, listening to the house band play a bachata and indulging in a fine cigar -one thing, he says, that the Cubans will always do better.
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