Pablo Motos

Pablo Motos learned to find the rhythm of the dance floor before stepping onto a set. In Requena he spun vinyl records at local clubs and taught guitar lessons to pay for his youthful expenses. Local radio was his first technical school, a bare-bones space where he learned to splice open-reel tapes, write radio ads and keep hours on air with a quick-fire sense of humor.

From Radio Requena he moved to Radio 9 and later to the Valencia branch of Onda Cero. There he ran local magazine shows and began experimenting with ensemble comedy formats alongside screenwriters who would stay with him for decades.

Nobody gave that idea a penny.

The Laboratory of Morning Radio

In 2002, the M80 radio network tasked him with taking over the morning show after Gomaespuma's departure. The challenge looked like a minefield, but Motos designed No somos nadie with a team of writers who broke down the news through short monologues, homemade explainers and comedic characters. That radio alarm clock drew more than seven hundred thousand daily listeners at its peak.

During that same period, he coordinated the scripts for El club de la comedia and co-wrote theater shows for comedians such as Enrique San Francisco. Stage comedy in Spain began to work thanks to that clockmaker's discipline, with jokes timed to the second and punchlines measured to the millimeter.

But the radio studio had become too small for him.

The 10 p.m. Factory

In September 2006, Cuatro premiered El hormiguero as a weekly show for Sunday afternoons. The start was modest, and critics were skeptical of a format that mixed rag puppets with laboratory experiments. The following year, the network moved it to a nightly daily slot.

And the gamble paid off perfectly.

In 2008, Motos and director Jorge Salvador created the production company 7 and Acción to retain control over the show's rights, hiring, and set technology. Three years later, in 2011, the team broke ties with Mediaset over budget disagreements and moved the entire broadcast to Antena 3 without missing a single scheduled day on air.

The company expanded its lineup with outside formats such as The Edge in 2021 and El camino a casa in 2023. In film, his work was limited to voice-dubbing roles in family animated projects such as Toy Story 3 in 2010 or Monsters University in 2013, appearances that worked as extensions of his media brand.

The Cost of the Square Millimeter

The Calle Alcalá studio runs like an industrial workshop. Motos rehearses every opening choreography, supervises the pyrotechnic tests and times international interviews through an ever-present earpiece. Hollywood stars such as Will Smith or Tom Cruise regularly agreed to appear because the show offered a showcase for promotion with no equivalent on European television.

Pressure on the time slot grew in September 2024 with the arrival of David Broncano on public television. That head-to-head competition fragmented nighttime audiences and forced 7 and Acción to be far more selective about the profiles on their debate panel.

In 2024, Atresmedia secured the presenter and his show through 2027. The production company 7 and Acción closed the 2023 financial year with declared revenue of thirty-two million euros and a net profit of seven million after surpassing two thousand five hundred live episodes.