Oviedo Cathedral Bars Netflix Over Anticlerical Script

The cathedral chapter of Oviedo denied Netflix permission to film interior scenes for a new adaptation of Leopoldo Alas “Clarín”’s La Regenta, judging the project an attack on the Church rather than a neutral literary treatment. The decision, taken weeks earlier under Archbishop Jesús Sanz Montes, became public at the end of October 2026.

Dean Benito Gallego said the chapter reviewed a 25-page script excerpt before refusing permission. “It is a good novel, but it is clearly not distinguished as a novel: it is an attack on the Church, and if, for example, they come to attack my mother, I cannot let my balcony be used for that,” he stated.

Production Leaves Asturias

Elástica Films, with director Mar Coll and starring Ester Expósito as Ana Ozores, relocated the entire shoot to the Basque Country. Asturias locations tied to the novel’s fictional Vetusta—including the cathedral itself—were abandoned. The cathedral had previously hosted related filming in 1974 and 1995.

On October 31, 2026, IU-Convocatoria por Oviedo and spokesperson Gaspar Llamazares denounced the refusal as anachronistic censorship that revived nineteenth-century arguments against the novel and forfeited cultural and tourist promotion for Oviedo.

On November 1, 2026, Somos Asturies and coordinator Kike López accused Archbishop Sanz Montes of acting as “a vulgar censor” and imposing political ideology on the Church’s actions, again calling the decision anachronistic and linking it to broader cultural censorship.

The cathedral chapter holds stewardship of a consecrated space dedicated to Catholic worship. Its refusal rests on the judgment that the script’s portrayal of clergy and Church life is hostile rather than merely critical, a distinction the dean framed in plain moral terms. Political critics framed the same judgment as outdated gatekeeping; the chapter framed it as fidelity to the dignity of the place and of the faith it serves.