Mayrin Villanueva, Claudia Alvarez
Televisa made a major change to the lead role in "En Tierras Salvajes" and it was all Univision's fault. Televisa

Mayrín Villanueva had been confirmed as the lead actress for the new Televisa production of "En Tierras Salvajes." The actress had been filming the first scenes of the telenovela project, but in a last minute shakeup, she was cut. The alleged reason was that in the U.S. Villanueva would've been overly seen as the lead in "Mujeres De Negro" on UniMas and a rerun airing of "Mentir Para Vivir" on Galavision. Univision executives decided that it was best if Mayrín was replaced to not oversaturate her.

"The network decided that there would be two projects on the air on Unviision and they couldn't overlap," she told Javier Poza. "If they overlap then they would've had to shelve 'En Tierras Salvajes' and obviously that's not convenient for the network or the producer. So they decided that I had to be out.

Mayrin is saddened by the situation because "one gets hopeful with the projects and you become part of the project and it hurts. I would've loved to be part of this but it's ok, there are many more projects to come.

Replacing Mayrín Villanueva es Claudia Alvarez, who's last telenovela, "Simplemente María," has not aired stateside. The last soap she was on Univision was "Hasta El Fin Del Mundo" where she shared credits with Marjorie de Sousa, David Zepeda and Pedro Fernández.

"En Tierras Salvajes" is the story of three brothers that fall for the same woman, the wife of one of them. The conflict of emotions that this tragic situation provokes will take them to a series of conflicts that will forever mark their lives. The premise is an original idea from Ramón Campos and Gema R. Neira, that will be adapted by Liliana Abud, Katia Rodríguez and Victoria Orvañanos.

"En Tierras Salvajes" will also star Cristián De La Fuente, Diego Olivera, Horacio Pancheri, Maricruz Nájera, Daniela Romo, Salvador Pineda, Lisardo y César Évora, Ninel Conde and Ximena Córdoba.

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