An 8-Part Series | Part 2
A sprint through Osuna, Carmona, Seville, Córdoba, Cádiz, Jerez, and Málaga begins as a simple hunt for filming locations, but in a land where wine now flows where blood once did, and every stone has been rehearsing for centuries, you realize Andalusia isn’t mirroring the movies; the movies have been imitating Andalusia.
Osuna: Where Fiction Bows to the Real
We entered Osuna through the gates of the Plaza de Toros, following Nieves into Daznak’s Great Pit from Game of Thrones (Season 5:Episode 9).
“This,” she said, leading me beneath the stone archway, “is where the dragons came.”
The sand underfoot was textured, calcareous sandstone shed from the quarries of Cerro de las Canteras, and it seemed to hold the memory of everything that had unfolded here. You could almost sense the dragon’s flames, the scripted screams, rising alongside the echoes of real toros, and spectators whose voices once filled these pocked stone seats of the cavea. Game of Thrones staged Daenerys’ great battle here, but the bullring’s true stories, of spectacle, of violence, of ritual, ran deeper than any episode. In person, the stone held a reality the series could only suggest.
Osuna’s quieter corners felt cinematic. El Coto de las Canteras, the vast sanctuary of the quarries, supplied the building blocks of the empire to the Romans and continued to feed every civilization that followed. Left behind are the carved reliefs of the stonemasons, fragments of their craft and their beliefs, still murmuring myths and memories into the present.
The frames from Game of Thrones were too small for the city it tried to transform and contain. On the horizon was the 16th-century Catholic church, Colegiata de Nuestra Señora de la Asuncion. Built of sillar limestone, hewn from Osuna’s ancient quarries that shaped the skyline, the church stands watch high over Osuna. However, we were to descend into its ornate Renaissance tombs and secondary cathedrals. Small, stooped, and tight, we moved into quirky rooms of statues, dimensional reliefs, and areas that could only please a monk. I was struck by the relief of Saint Jerome in Penitence, a tortured shell of a man caught in a tragic drama of his own design. A movie scene he would never escape, played over and over again from the Louvre to Osuna.
Colegiata is a citadel of faith rising on the highest ridge of Osuna, watching over the residences since the mid-sixteenth century. We walked into a hush of aristocratic devotion, part Renaissance austerity, baroque art, part Andalusian grandeur. Low tones of the devout could be heard as I passed in front of the golden Baroque altarpiece, a cascade of gilded wood that rises like a sunburst against limestone. Carved in the seventeenth century, it merges saints, columns, and radiant ornament into a single upward sweep meant to pull the eye, and the soul, toward heaven.
As I gazed in awe at the grandeur, I did not hold the ascetic discipline of Saint Jerome and soon needed my first taste of Andalusia.
We left the cool stone of the Colegiata and descended into Osuna’s palace quarter, a narrow run of ochre facades and carved noble houses where wrought-iron balconies lean over the street as if waiting for a festival. The family crests, heavy doors, and centuries of aristocratic families escorted us as we made our way toward Casa Curro, the town’s beloved tavern.
Inside, the dining room was alive with what I assume is its usual chorus, a ladies’ afternoon gathering laughing over shared plates, families leaning in close, small tables of men in deep, animated debate. We found a place in the back and ordered prawns in rich Andalusian sauce and a local Osuna wine, an earthy young red the region pours with pride.
The food arrived bright and generous, each dish carrying that deep, confident flavor the restaurant is known for. On the walls, a quiet nod to Game of Thrones, the cast had eaten here during filming, even celebrating a birthday, which connected even the act of having dinner to the town’s cinematic legacy. We lingered for a moment; listening and watching, before driving on toward Carmona, where David from the film office was waiting for us at the Parador. This was Andalusia’s first turn in the local narrative: what was happening in the margins was beginning to reveal the story.
Next in the Series
Andalusia Beyond the Frame — Part 3 of 8
Carmona: Storming the Fort in El Cubete Opens Unscripted Moments
In the next installment, we travel to Carmona, where we taste an Andalusian street orange and dance the flamenco into the night. It felt like chasing movies led us into our own personal movie scene.
About the Author:
Erik Nachtrieb
CEO & Cofounder, SetJetters
ShotSync Image: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
