Joaquín Cosío has had a long career. And yet, Apple TV+‘s Midnight Family, his newest show, is still giving him new things. The show, which follows a family of paramedics who operate a private ambulance in Mexico City, is about the healthcare crisis in the country, yes, but it’s also about the people do the everyday work of helping others. Cosío spoke to Fangirlish about the experience of the show, playing a father and the absurd fact that there are only 100 ambulances available for the entire population of Mexico City, which is over 10 million.
“It’s certainly very sad to realize that a city as huge as Mexico City, that regardless of its size, should have to have the resources to be able to supply the minimum number of ambulances necessary to protect our community, our people, our city, doesn’t,” Cosío said. “So, it’s very disappointing to know that this is not considered a public health emergency and that we can continue to subsist without an army of ambulances ready to assist all of us.”
However, when there’s a gap in the market, people will exploit it. “This gives rise to the fact that private ambulances, or so-called pirate ambulances, can exist. These ambulances serve a purpose, to fulfill the obligation of the state to provide a service. So, they are very important. They save lives, it’s that simple.”
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Not just that, for Cosío, “seeing how Midnight Family is about a family that lives off a private ambulance or a pirate ambulance, we can understand a little of this universe that we don’t know, of a city that, in the middle of the night, while we sleep peacefully, lives through a series of incredible and unbelievable circumstances. We sleep, but in the meantime, there are a lot of people working to save others.”
For Cosío, his character is a “a hero,” because as the series shows “they don’t charge” upfront or deny care. “It’s a private service that is subject to what the person or the accident victim, or the family of the accident victim, wants to give them in a kind way. Generally, they are low-income families that don’t have a lot to give.”
“So, the service is, in addition to being so urgent, very poorly paid.”
This idea of the heroism behind the characters is partly what drew Cosío to the project, who shared he was very interested in “the possibility of an original story, talking about these characters that have nothing to be spectacular.”
Instead, “these are ordinary people, people from the streets, people that you can find there, and yet, inside their ambulance, saving a life, they become heroes, anonymous heroes that no one takes into account and no one sees. “
Not just that, Cosío told us that since he made Midnight Family, every time he hears an ambulance “I quickly feel respect and deep admiration for those who are inside it.”
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In the show Cosío plays Ramón, the patriarch, the dad, the one trying to protect his children at all cost and yet realizing he can’t. And sometimes, for parents, protecting their kids means lying to them about things they should know. “There are secrets in that family,” Cosío told us. “I suppose that, like in all of them, things are hidden, the story of the grandparents, of the great-grandparents. And in this case, it’s not the exception.”
“And it’s very unique that, in this case, Julito is the one who finds out how the shadow of death accompanies Ramón at all times. And that, of course, adds a very important line of tension to the series. There’s always that possibility that something will happen.”
The reason it feels that way, and it ties into Cosío’s praise for the show, is how well everything flows together and the care that was taking into making not just the visuals work, but the characters as well. “I think that the story is very well constructed. Not necessarily because I’m there. I just think it’s very well constructed. It’s part of what immediately seduced me. Very well-written scripts, very well-dialogued, with a series of adventures that always go forward, forward, forward, in a way that I think is very well justified in the ten episodes.”
If you haven’t watched them yet, now’s your chance.
Midnight Family is available to stream on Apple TV+.
