Chaimaa Fachtal — The Producer Who Protects the Idea

Chaimaa Fachtal didn't set out to build a production company. She set out to solve films. A painter by background, she found her way into production by becoming fascinated by the space between what a director is protecting in an idea and what it takes to make that idea real. That gap — between concept and cut, as Magic Hour puts it — is still where she does her best work. Based in Casablanca, she co-founded Magic Hour with her partner Kris, a creative producer and occasional director, and has since built the company into one of Morocco's most distinctive international service partners.

There wasn't one defining moment that pulled you into production — you've described it more as an environment you kept finding yourself in. What was it about that environment that hooked you?

Chaimaa: It was working very closely with ambitious directors and seeing how much of a producer's role sits between an idea and its reality. I became fascinated by understanding what a director was really protecting in an idea. Sometimes the solution could change completely once you understood the intention behind the request.

That was the part of production that hooked me: standing between an idea and reality and finding the path between the two. It is still the part of the job I love most today. What excites me is solving the film.

You come from an artistic background — you're also a painter. How does that sit alongside the practical discipline that production demands?

Chaimaa: For me, production has never been purely operational. Coming from an artistic background inevitably shapes the way I approach films. You develop a sensitivity to composition, colour, atmosphere — all the things that cannot be reduced to a schedule or an Excel sheet.

At the same time, years of producing end to end taught me the practical discipline behind that: every creative choice eventually has a practical consequence. A location affects transport. A camera movement affects equipment. A casting decision affects timing. Creativity and production are never really separate worlds.

Kris adds another layer to that. He is a creative producer and also directs at times, so there is a strong visual instinct on both sides of the company. We care deeply about the image, but we also understand everything that has to happen behind it for the image to exist.

Magic Hour was conceived around a specific idea — being a partner that shapes the solution, not just executes it. How did you arrive at that?

Chaimaa: It happened gradually as we started working with more international productions. The more international work we encountered, the more I realised that our most valuable contribution was not simply executing well in Morocco. It was bringing that production experience into the conversation early enough to help shape the solution.

That changed the kind of company I wanted to build. Magic Hour was conceived as a local partner capable of contributing to the production thinking — not simply entering the project once every important decision had already been made. That shift in perspective is really what turned Magic Hour from an idea into a company.

You've said the foundation of service production is trust. What does that actually mean in practice?

Chaimaa: Service production is often a remote relationship before it becomes a physical one. Someone may be sitting in London or New Zealand, making important decisions about a shoot in Morocco based almost entirely on the information I send them. If I say a location exists, it has to exist. If I say a cast is available, it has to be available. And if I'm not certain, I say so.

It sounds simple, but I think it is one of the most important disciplines in our business. During a pitch, there can be a temptation to make everything sound confirmed and perfect. But the worst thing you can do is sell somebody a reality they later discover does not exist.

When a producer abroad chooses me to represent Morocco on their behalf, they are effectively lending me their eyes. I take that very seriously.

Morocco is most often sold internationally through its desert landscape. You seem to be on a mission to change that.

Chaimaa: Local expertise is not simply knowing a lot of suppliers. It is knowing what a place can become on screen. And Morocco contains very different realities. A communication style that works perfectly in Casablanca may be completely wrong for a remote desert location.

We recently brought a Dutch director from Amsterdam to Casablanca for a baby campaign. During the location recce, he became almost obsessed with the city. He kept discovering buildings, apartments, streets and interiors and asking, essentially, "How does nobody know about this?"

Casablanca has a particular cinematic quality because it hasn't been polished into a postcard. It is layered and intensely lived-in. Art Deco and modernist architecture sit beside raw streets, elegant villas, dense neighbourhoods and extraordinary interiors hidden behind ordinary façades. He came to make one film and left wanting to return for the city itself.

I love that story because Morocco is so often represented internationally through the desert. The desert is extraordinary, but it is only one of our cinematic identities.

When something goes wrong on a shoot — and things always go wrong — what's your instinct?

Chaimaa: Understanding before reacting. When something goes wrong in production, it is rarely just one thing. If somebody called me at 11pm because their shoot in Morocco tomorrow was falling apart, my first instinct would not be to immediately start making calls. I would get in my car, meet them, and understand exactly what is happening. What is the real problem? What created it? What is connected to it? What happens if we move one piece? Only then do I start activating people and solutions.

Speed matters in production. But speed without understanding can make a problem bigger.

And underneath all of that is respect. I can be extremely demanding about the work, but I am equally demanding about how people are treated. The runner deserves the same basic dignity as the director. A production can be stressful without becoming disrespectful. Pressure is part of our industry. Humiliation shouldn't be.

What made joining GPN the right move for Magic Hour?

Chaimaa: What attracted me to GPN is the idea that service production is fundamentally a producer-to-producer relationship. When someone sends a director, an agency, a client and a significant budget into another country, what they need is not simply a supplier. They need a counterpart. Someone they can call when everything is going beautifully, but also when it isn't.

That is what I want Magic Hour to be for producers coming to Morocco. And that is what excites me about joining GPN: building that relationship in both directions. There is something very reassuring about knowing that when I need that same level of trust in another part of the world, there is a producer in the network I can call too.

Not simply exchanging jobs. Exchanging trust.