At her 25th wedding anniversary party, Victoria Mendoza (Victoria Ruffo) finds out her husband Enrique Mendoza (Arturo Peniche) has a mistress, Tatiana López (Andrea Lopez). Suddenly Victoria's whole life crashes around her as she realizes her marriage is wrecked. As she tries to heal the pain of her husband's adultery, she meets the 33-year-old Jerónimo (Mauricio Ochmann) out of the blue.[1]
Victoria falls for this younger man, giving her a second chance at the true love and passion missing in her loveless marriage. Many of her loved ones oppose her relationship, including her daughters Paula (Geraldine Bazán) and Mariana (Laura Perico), her mother Mercedes (Margalida Castro) and her ex-husband. They blame her for the breakup. On the other hand, her son Santiago (Ricardo Abarca) offers unconditional support.[1] Victoria has many problems but does she know she has those problems? Can she solve them? So Victoria faces a difficult decision: either fight to keep true love alive or surrender and let it slip away.
Production
Victoria is a remake of Mirada de mujer (The Gaze of a Woman) [which is a remake of the lost 1993 Colombian telenovela Señora Isabel] and of its sequel, El Regreso. This show's working titles were Tiempos de Victoria (Victoria's Times), Señora Isabel and The Mauricio Ochmann Project.
The show's premiere on Telemundo reached 782,000 core adult (ages 18–49) viewers, according to NTI, and over 1.5 million total viewers overall.[2] The expanded the series' run to about 160 chapters from the standard length, 120 shows. There was no question of announcing any plans to remake Mirada's sequel, El Regreso (The Return) as Victoria covered El Regreso (both in one).[3] Géraldine Bazán won a Latin ACE Award for "Best Inspiring Young Actress" during her role as Paula.[4]
On August 4, 2008, Telemundo broadcast the alternate ending of Victoria through Yahoo! Telemundo. It was the first alternate ending of a Spanish Telenovela ever aired by Telemundo in the United States. The first ending was romantic; the second was realism. Victoria let Ochmann leave; then we saw her talking about how she's got everything (and doesn't need him): like her business, her grandchild, her amigas sinceras, etc. There was an off-stage third ending wherein Ochmann made a pareja with Adriana Campos ("Yumelay from Zorro"—cute little Indian), who played his middle-story girlfriend (Penelope) in Spain whom he eventually left to go back to Victoria.[5]
