China Zorrilla
Encyclopedia
China Zorrilla is an award-winning Uruguayan theater, film and television actress.
She made over 40 appearances in film and TV since 1971. She has lived in Argentina for over 35 years and is active in the TV, theater and Cinema of Argentina
. A very popular star in the Rioplatense area, she is regarded as one of the Grand Dames of the South American theater stage.
In 2008 the French Government named China Zorrilla a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, and in 2011 the Government of Uruguay saluted her with a post stamp with her image.
(1891–1975), a disciple of Antoine Bourdelle
and author of several important monuments in Uruguay and Argentina. Her grandfather, Juan Zorrilla de San Martín
, is the National poet of Uruguay. Her older sister Guma Zorrilla (1919-2001) was a distinguished theater costume designer.
She grew up with her four sisters in Paris
, back in Montevideo attended the Sacré Cœur School. In 1948 she won a British Council
fellowship to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
in London
where she had classes with the great Greek tragic actress Katina Paxinou
.
´s L'Annonce Faite a Marie (The Annunciation of Marie
). As a member of the 'National Comedy of Uruguay' she worked in the Solís Theatre
under the direction of the legendary Spanish actress Margarita Xirgu
who directed her in García Lorca's Bodas de sangre
(Blood Wedding
) and other classics.
As the preeminent First Lady
of the Uruguayan stage during the 1950–60s she appeared as Brecht
's Mother Courage and Her Children
, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet
, Macbeth
and A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Chekhov
's The Seagull
, Wilder
's Our Town
, Neil Simon
's Plaza Suite
, Molière
's Tartuffe
, Giraudoux
's The Madwoman of Chaillot
and other plays by Pirandello, Peter Ustinov
, Jean Giraudoux
, Tirso de Molina
, Lope de Vega
, Henrik Ibsen
, August Strindberg
, J. B. Priestley
, Ferenc Molnár
and others. A very fine comedienne, she was acclaimed as Thornton Wilder
's The Matchmaker
winning special acclaim as the eccentric Judith Bliss in Noel Coward
's Hay Fever
.
With actor Enrique Guarnero and writer Antonio Larreta she co-founded the TCM (Teatro Ciudad de Montevideo) touring Buenos Aires
, Paris and Madrid
. In the Spanish capital they won the Spanish Critics Award for their performances of García Lorca and Lope de Vega
.
During 1964–66 she took a sabbatical leave moving to New York
where she worked as a French teacher and Broadway
secretary. In New York she gave performances of Canciones para mirar, a musical for kids on texts by Argentinean poet Maria Elena Walsh
. As correspondent of the Uruguayan newspaper El País she covered many events in America and Europe as the Cannes Film Festival
.
As opera
director she directed Puccini's La bohème
, Verdi's Un ballo in maschera
in the Solís Theatre
and Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia in the Teatro Argentino de La Plata
. In the Uruguayan TV she had her own talk-show for many years.
by director Lautaro Murúa
with Alfredo Alcón. The next Summer she successfully replaced actress Ana María Campoy
in Butterflies are Free
(marking also the theatrical debut of Susana Giménez
) in Mar del Plata
; she decided to move to Argentina where she will have a remarkable career in television, theater and movies.
Coincidently, in 1973–77 she was forbidden to perform in Uruguay by the de facto
military regime. When the democracy returned to her native country in the 1980s, she made a triumphal comeback at the Teatro Solís.
In theater she was particularly successful playing historic characters: Emily Dickinson
(by William Luce), Victoria Ocampo
(by Monica Ottino), Mrs. Patrick Campbell (in Dear Liar: A Comedy of Letters, on the correspondence of George Bernard Shaw
and actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell) and in plays by Jean Cocteau
, Lucille Fletcher, Oscar Viale and fellow Uruguayan Jacobo Langsner. She also repeated her warhorse Hay Fever
as "Judith Bliss".
In the last decade, she has obtained an outstanding success (and four awards as "Best actress in a play") as sculptor Helen Martins in Athol Fugard
's The Road to Mecca
and as Eve
in an adaption she conceived of Mark Twain
's Eve's Diary
(The private diary of Adam and Eve).
Beginning in the mid-seventies she toured extensively the country several times and internationally, appearing at Washington, D.C.
's Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, in Barcelona
, Bogotá
, Lima
, Caracas
, Tel Aviv
, Miami, San Juan
, Santiago
, Montevideo
, Punta del Este
, Sao Pablo, Asunción, and other cities.
In 1995 she reprised the role of Persephone
premiered by Victoria Ocampo
in Perséphone
, the opera-oratorio by Igor Stravinsky
–André Gide
at the Teatro Colón (Buenos Aires).
As theater director (and producer and adapter) she has an impressive list of plays and musicals: Carlo Goldoni
's Arlecchino (Harlequin Servant of two Masters), Reginald Rose
's 12 Angry Men, Georges Feydeau
's A Flea in Her Ear
and Neil Simon
's Lost in Yonkers
.
In movies she worked in several films (see list below). Winner of Best Actress in La Habana Film Festival for "Darse Cuenta" she left indelibles performances in Summer of the Colt (a Canadian coproduction), Maria Luisa Bemberg's Nobody's Wife, The Jewish Gauchos, the coproduction The Plague (starring William Hurt
and Raúl Juliá
), Edgardo Cozarinsky
's Guerriers et captives (with Dominique Sanda
and Leslie Caron
), Manuel Puig
's "Pubis Angelical", Adolfo Aristarain
's Lasts Days of the Victim and in the Cult classic
Argentinian Black comedy
Esperando la carroza (Waiting for the Hearse) (1986).
In later years, she obtained wide critical and audience recognition for her recent performances as the Mother in Conversaciones con mamá in 2005 (2004 Best Actress Award Moscow Film Festival and the Málaga
Film Festival) and as Elsa, a peculiar old lady in the movie Elsa & Fred (2005) which won her several awards, including the Silver Condor for Best Actress.
by the Chilean government and awards in her native country.
She was named "Illustrious Citizen" in Buenos Aires, Montevideo and other Argentinian cities and two theaters bears her name.
In 2008 she was made Knight (Chevalier) of the Légion d'honneur
by the French Government.
She made over 40 appearances in film and TV since 1971. She has lived in Argentina for over 35 years and is active in the TV, theater and Cinema of Argentina
Cinema of Argentina
The cinema of Argentina has a tradition dating back to the late nineteenth century, and continues to play a role in the culture of Argentina....
. A very popular star in the Rioplatense area, she is regarded as one of the Grand Dames of the South American theater stage.
In 2008 the French Government named China Zorrilla a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, and in 2011 the Government of Uruguay saluted her with a post stamp with her image.
Beginnings
Born into a patrician and artistic oriented Uruguayan family, her father was the sculptor José Luis Zorrilla de San MartínJosé Luis Zorrilla de San Martín
José Luis Zorrilla de San Martín was a Uruguayan sculptor.One of the pivotal sculptors from Uruguay, he have significant impact in the monuments of the capital city of Montevideo...
(1891–1975), a disciple of Antoine Bourdelle
Antoine Bourdelle
Antoine Bourdelle , originally Émile Antoine Bourdelle, was an influential and prolific French sculptor, painter, and teacher.-Career:...
and author of several important monuments in Uruguay and Argentina. Her grandfather, Juan Zorrilla de San Martín
Juan Zorrilla de San Martín
Juan Zorrilla de San Martín was a Uruguayan epic poet - he is referred as "National Poet of Uruguay" -and political figure . He is featured on the 20-peso note.-Well-known poems:...
, is the National poet of Uruguay. Her older sister Guma Zorrilla (1919-2001) was a distinguished theater costume designer.
She grew up with her four sisters in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, back in Montevideo attended the Sacré Cœur School. In 1948 she won a British Council
British Council
The British Council is a United Kingdom-based organisation specialising in international educational and cultural opportunities. It is registered as a charity both in England and Wales, and in Scotland...
fellowship to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art is a drama school located in London, United Kingdom. It is generally regarded as one of the most renowned drama schools in the world, and is one of the oldest drama schools in the United Kingdom, having been founded in 1904.RADA is an affiliate school of the...
in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
where she had classes with the great Greek tragic actress Katina Paxinou
Katina Paxinou
Katina Paxinou was a Greek film and theatre actress.-Early life:Born Aikaterini Konstantopoulou in Piraeus, Greece, she trained as an opera singer, and appeared in the operatic version of Maeterlinck's "Sister Beatrice," with a score by Dimitri Mitropoulos, but changed career and joined the Greek...
.
Uruguay
Back in Montevideo she made her debut in Paul ClaudelPaul Claudel
Paul Claudel was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholicism.-Life:...
´s L'Annonce Faite a Marie (The Annunciation of Marie
The Annunciation of Marie
The Annunciation of Marie is the English-language title of the 1991 critically acclaimed French-Canadian film L'Annonce faite à Marie, an adaptation of the play of the same name by Paul Claudel.-Production:...
). As a member of the 'National Comedy of Uruguay' she worked in the Solís Theatre
Solís Theatre
Solis Theatre is Uruguay's oldest theatre. It was built in 1856 and is currently owned by the government of Montevideo. It is located in Plaza Independencia ....
under the direction of the legendary Spanish actress Margarita Xirgu
Margarita Xirgu
Margarita Xirgu, also Margarida Xirgu was a Catalan stage actress, who was greatly popular throughout her country and Latin America. A friend of the poet Federico García Lorca, she was forced into exile during Francisco Franco's dictatorship of Spain, but continued her work in America...
who directed her in García Lorca's Bodas de sangre
Bodas de sangre
Blood Wedding is a tragedy by the Spanish dramatist Federico García Lorca. It was written in 1932 and first performed in Madrid in March 1933 and later that year in Buenos Aires...
(Blood Wedding
Blood Wedding
Blood Wedding may refer to:* The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, also known as the Paris blood wedding* Blood Wedding , a 1933 play by the Spanish playwright Federico García Lorca* The Ruse blood wedding, a 1910 massacre in Rousse, Bulgaria...
) and other classics.
As the preeminent First Lady
First Lady
First Lady or First Gentlemanis the unofficial title used in some countries for the spouse of an elected head of state.It is not normally used to refer to the spouse or partner of a prime minister; the husband or wife of the British Prime Minister is usually informally referred to as prime...
of the Uruguayan stage during the 1950–60s she appeared as Brecht
Brecht
Brecht is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Antwerp. The municipality comprises the towns of Brecht proper, Sint-Job-in't-Goor and Sint-Lenaarts. On January 1, 2006 Brecht had a total population of 26,464...
's Mother Courage and Her Children
Mother Courage and Her Children
Mother Courage and Her Children is a play written in 1939 by the German dramatist and poet Bertolt Brecht with significant contributions from Margarete Steffin...
, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
, Macbeth
Macbeth
The Tragedy of Macbeth is a play by William Shakespeare about a regicide and its aftermath. It is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy and is believed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1607...
and A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 and 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta...
, Chekhov
Chekhov
- People :* Alexander Chekhov, older brother of Anton Chekhov* Anton Chekhov , Russian writer** Chekhov Gymnasium, school, and now museum in Taganrog** Chekhov Library, public library in Taganrog** Anton Chekhov class motorship...
's The Seagull
The Seagull
The Seagull is the first of what are generally considered to be the four major plays by the Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov. The Seagull was written in 1895 and first produced in 1896...
, Wilder
Thornton Wilder
Thornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He received three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and two for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and a National Book Award for his novel The Eighth Day.-Early years:Wilder was born in Madison,...
's Our Town
Our Town
Our Town is a three-act play by American playwright Thornton Wilder. It is a character story about an average town's citizens in the early twentieth century as depicted through their everyday lives...
, Neil Simon
Neil Simon
Neil Simon is an American playwright and screenwriter. He has written numerous Broadway plays, including Brighton Beach Memoirs, Biloxi Blues, and The Odd Couple. He won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Lost In Yonkers. He has written the screenplays for several of his plays that...
's Plaza Suite
Plaza Suite
Plaza Suite is a comedy play by Neil Simon.-Plot:The play is composed of three acts, each involving different characters but all set in Suite 719 of New York City's Plaza Hotel...
, Molière
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...
's Tartuffe
Tartuffe
Tartuffe is a comedy by Molière. It is one of his most famous plays.-History:Molière wrote Tartuffe in 1664...
, Giraudoux
Jean Giraudoux
Hippolyte Jean Giraudoux was a French novelist, essayist, diplomat and playwright. He is considered among the most important French dramatists of the period between World War I and World War II. His work is noted for its stylistic elegance and poetic fantasy...
's The Madwoman of Chaillot
The Madwoman of Chaillot
The Madwoman of Chaillot is a play, a poetic satire, by French dramatist Jean Giraudoux, written in 1943 and first performed in 1945, after his death. The play has two acts and follows the convention of the classical unities...
and other plays by Pirandello, Peter Ustinov
Peter Ustinov
Peter Alexander Ustinov CBE was an English actor, writer and dramatist. He was also renowned as a filmmaker, theatre and opera director, stage designer, author, screenwriter, comedian, humourist, newspaper and magazine columnist, radio broadcaster and television presenter...
, Jean Giraudoux
Jean Giraudoux
Hippolyte Jean Giraudoux was a French novelist, essayist, diplomat and playwright. He is considered among the most important French dramatists of the period between World War I and World War II. His work is noted for its stylistic elegance and poetic fantasy...
, Tirso de Molina
Tirso de Molina
Tirso de Molina was a Spanish Baroque dramatist, poet and a Roman Catholic monk.Originally Gabriel Téllez, he was born in Madrid. He studied at Alcalá de Henares, joined the Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy on November 4, 1600, and entered the Monastery of San Antolín at Guadalajara,...
, Lope de Vega
Lope de Vega
Félix Arturo Lope de Vega y Carpio was a Spanish playwright and poet. He was one of the key figures in the Spanish Golden Century Baroque literature...
, Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...
, August Strindberg
August Strindberg
Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...
, J. B. Priestley
J. B. Priestley
John Boynton Priestley, OM , known as J. B. Priestley, was an English novelist, playwright and broadcaster. He published 26 novels, notably The Good Companions , as well as numerous dramas such as An Inspector Calls...
, Ferenc Molnár
Ferenc Molnár
LanguageFerenc Molnár was a Hungarian dramatist and novelist. His Americanized name was Franz Molnar...
and others. A very fine comedienne, she was acclaimed as Thornton Wilder
Thornton Wilder
Thornton Niven Wilder was an American playwright and novelist. He received three Pulitzer Prizes, one for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey and two for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth, and a National Book Award for his novel The Eighth Day.-Early years:Wilder was born in Madison,...
's The Matchmaker
The Matchmaker
The Matchmaker is a play by Thornton Wilder.The play has a long and colorful history. John Oxenford's 1835 one-act farce A Day Well Spent had been extended into a full-length play entitled Einen Jux will er sich machen by Austrian playwright Johann Nestroy in 1842...
winning special acclaim as the eccentric Judith Bliss in Noel Coward
Noël Coward
Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
's Hay Fever
Hay Fever
Hay Fever is a comic play written by Noël Coward in 1924 and first produced in 1925 with Marie Tempest as the first Judith Bliss. Laura Hope Crews played the role in New York...
.
With actor Enrique Guarnero and writer Antonio Larreta she co-founded the TCM (Teatro Ciudad de Montevideo) touring Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, Paris and Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
. In the Spanish capital they won the Spanish Critics Award for their performances of García Lorca and Lope de Vega
Lope de Vega
Félix Arturo Lope de Vega y Carpio was a Spanish playwright and poet. He was one of the key figures in the Spanish Golden Century Baroque literature...
.
During 1964–66 she took a sabbatical leave moving to New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
where she worked as a French teacher and Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
secretary. In New York she gave performances of Canciones para mirar, a musical for kids on texts by Argentinean poet Maria Elena Walsh
María Elena Walsh
María Elena Walsh was an Argentine poet, novelist, musician, dramaturge, writer and composer, mainly known for her songs and books for children.-Biography:...
. As correspondent of the Uruguayan newspaper El País she covered many events in America and Europe as the Cannes Film Festival
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...
.
As opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
director she directed Puccini's La bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
, Verdi's Un ballo in maschera
Un ballo in maschera
Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
in the Solís Theatre
Solís Theatre
Solis Theatre is Uruguay's oldest theatre. It was built in 1856 and is currently owned by the government of Montevideo. It is located in Plaza Independencia ....
and Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia in the Teatro Argentino de La Plata
Teatro Argentino de La Plata
The Teatro Argentino de La Plata is the second most important lyric opera house in Argentina, after the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. The Teatro Argentino is located in a central block of the city of La Plata, the capital of Buenos Aires Province...
. In the Uruguayan TV she had her own talk-show for many years.
Argentina
In 1971, she made her belated film debut at 49 in Un Guapo del 900Un Guapo del 900
Un Guapo del 900 is a 1952 Argentine film....
by director Lautaro Murúa
Lautaro Murúa
Lautaro Murúa was a Chilean-born Argentine actor, film director, and screenwriter. He is one of the best known actors in the Cinema of Argentina....
with Alfredo Alcón. The next Summer she successfully replaced actress Ana María Campoy
Ana María Campoy
Ana María Campoy was an Argentine actress of Colombian origin. She was born in Bogotá, the child of a couple of actors who had a theatre company in Spain. She began acting at the age of 4, and at 17 she formed her own company....
in Butterflies are Free
Butterflies Are Free
Butterflies Are Free is a 1972 film based on a play by Leonard Gershe. The 1972 film was produced by M.J. Frankovich, released by Columbia Pictures, directed by Milton Katselas and adapted for the screen by Gershe. It was released on 6 July, 1972 in the USA.Goldie Hawn and Edward Albert starred...
(marking also the theatrical debut of Susana Giménez
Susana Giménez
Susana Giménez, née María Susana Giménez Aubert is an Argentine actress, ex-vedette and television host....
) in Mar del Plata
Mar del Plata
Mar del Plata is an Argentine city located on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, south of Buenos Aires. Mar del Plata is the second largest city of Buenos Aires Province. The name "Mar del Plata" had apparently the sense of "sea of the Río de la Plata region" or "adjoining sea to the Río de la Plata"...
; she decided to move to Argentina where she will have a remarkable career in television, theater and movies.
Coincidently, in 1973–77 she was forbidden to perform in Uruguay by the de facto
De facto
De facto is a Latin expression that means "concerning fact." In law, it often means "in practice but not necessarily ordained by law" or "in practice or actuality, but not officially established." It is commonly used in contrast to de jure when referring to matters of law, governance, or...
military regime. When the democracy returned to her native country in the 1980s, she made a triumphal comeback at the Teatro Solís.
In theater she was particularly successful playing historic characters: Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet. Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, to a successful family with strong community ties, she lived a mostly introverted and reclusive life...
(by William Luce), Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo Aguirre was an Argentine writer and intellectual, described by Jorge Luis Borges as La mujer más argentina ....
(by Monica Ottino), Mrs. Patrick Campbell (in Dear Liar: A Comedy of Letters, on the correspondence of George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
and actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell) and in plays by Jean Cocteau
Jean Cocteau
Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau was a French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, playwright, artist and filmmaker. His circle of associates, friends and lovers included Kenneth Anger, Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Marlene Dietrich, Coco Chanel, Erik Satie, María...
, Lucille Fletcher, Oscar Viale and fellow Uruguayan Jacobo Langsner. She also repeated her warhorse Hay Fever
Hay Fever
Hay Fever is a comic play written by Noël Coward in 1924 and first produced in 1925 with Marie Tempest as the first Judith Bliss. Laura Hope Crews played the role in New York...
as "Judith Bliss".
In the last decade, she has obtained an outstanding success (and four awards as "Best actress in a play") as sculptor Helen Martins in Athol Fugard
Athol Fugard
Athol Fugard is a South African playwright, novelist, actor, and director who writes in English, best known for his political plays opposing the South African system of apartheid and for the 2005 Academy-Award winning film of his novel Tsotsi, directed by Gavin Hood...
's The Road to Mecca
The Road to Mecca
The Road to Mecca is a play by South Africa's Athol Fugard.It was inspired by the story of Helen Martins who lived in Nieu-Bethesda, Eastern Cape, South Africa and created The Owl House, now a national monument....
and as Eve
Eve
Eve is the first woman created by God in the Book of Genesis.Eve may also refer to:-People:*Eve , a common given name and surname*Eve , American recording artist and actress-Places:...
in an adaption she conceived of Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...
's Eve's Diary
Eve's Diary
Eve's Diary is a comic short story by Mark Twain.It was first published in the 1905 Christmas issue of the magazine Harper's Bazaar, and in book format in June 1906 by Harper and Brothers publishing house...
(The private diary of Adam and Eve).
Beginning in the mid-seventies she toured extensively the country several times and internationally, appearing at Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
's Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, in Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
, Bogotá
Bogotá
Bogotá, Distrito Capital , from 1991 to 2000 called Santa Fé de Bogotá, is the capital, and largest city, of Colombia. It is also designated by the national constitution as the capital of the department of Cundinamarca, even though the city of Bogotá now comprises an independent Capital district...
, Lima
Lima
Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...
, Caracas
Caracas
Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...
, Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
, Miami, San Juan
San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...
, Santiago
Santiago, Chile
Santiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level...
, Montevideo
Montevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...
, Punta del Este
Punta del Este
Punta del Este is a resort town on the Atlantic Coast in the Maldonado Department of southeastern Uruguay. It is located on the intersection of Route 10 with Route 39, directly southeast of the department capital Maldonado and about east of Montevideo...
, Sao Pablo, Asunción, and other cities.
In 1995 she reprised the role of Persephone
Persephone
In Greek mythology, Persephone , also called Kore , is the daughter of Zeus and the harvest-goddess Demeter, and queen of the underworld; she was abducted by Hades, the god-king of the underworld....
premiered by Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo Aguirre was an Argentine writer and intellectual, described by Jorge Luis Borges as La mujer más argentina ....
in Perséphone
Persephone
In Greek mythology, Persephone , also called Kore , is the daughter of Zeus and the harvest-goddess Demeter, and queen of the underworld; she was abducted by Hades, the god-king of the underworld....
, the opera-oratorio by Igor Stravinsky
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
–André Gide
André Gide
André Paul Guillaume Gide was a French author and winner of the Nobel Prize in literature in 1947. Gide's career ranged from its beginnings in the symbolist movement, to the advent of anticolonialism between the two World Wars.Known for his fiction as well as his autobiographical works, Gide...
at the Teatro Colón (Buenos Aires).
As theater director (and producer and adapter) she has an impressive list of plays and musicals: Carlo Goldoni
Carlo Goldoni
Carlo Osvaldo Goldoni was an Italian playwright and librettist from the Republic of Venice. His works include some of Italy's most famous and best-loved plays. Audiences have admired the plays of Goldoni for their ingenious mix of wit and honesty...
's Arlecchino (Harlequin Servant of two Masters), Reginald Rose
Reginald Rose
Reginald Rose was an American film and television writer most widely known for his work in the early years of television drama. Rose's work is marked by its treatment of controversial social and political issues...
's 12 Angry Men, Georges Feydeau
Georges Feydeau
Georges Feydeau was a French playwright of the era known as the Belle Époque. He is remembered for his many lively farces.-Biography:Georges Feydeau was born in Paris, the son of novelist Ernest-Aimé Feydeau and Léocadie Bogaslawa Zalewska. At the age of twenty, Feydeau wrote his first comic...
's A Flea in Her Ear
A Flea in Her Ear
A Flea in Her Ear is a play by Georges Feydeau written in 1907, at the height of the Belle Époque.-Plot:...
and Neil Simon
Neil Simon
Neil Simon is an American playwright and screenwriter. He has written numerous Broadway plays, including Brighton Beach Memoirs, Biloxi Blues, and The Odd Couple. He won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Lost In Yonkers. He has written the screenplays for several of his plays that...
's Lost in Yonkers
Lost in Yonkers
Lost in Yonkers is a 1991 Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Neil Simon. After eleven previews, the Broadway production, produced by Emanuel Azenberg and directed by Gene Saks, opened on February 21, 1991 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, where it ran for 780 performances...
.
William Hurt
William McGill Hurt is an American stage and film actor. He received his acting training at the Juilliard School, and began acting on stage in the 1970s. Hurt made his film debut as a troubled scientist in the science-fiction feature Altered States , for which he received a Golden Globe nomination...
and Raúl Juliá
Raúl Juliá
Raúl Rafael Juliá y Arcelay was a Puerto Rican actor.Born in San Juan, he gained interest in acting while still in school. Upon completing his studies, Juliá decided to pursue a career in acting. After performing in the local scene for some time, he was convinced by entertainment personality Orson...
), Edgardo Cozarinsky
Edgardo Cozarinsky
Edgardo Cozarinsky is a writer and filmmaker. He is best known for writing Vudú urbano.- Life :His family name goes back to his great grandparents, Jewish immigrants from Kiev and Odessa at the end of the 19th century, his first name tells of his mother's infatuation with Edgar Allan Poe.After an...
's Guerriers et captives (with Dominique Sanda
Dominique Sanda
Dominique Sanda is a French actress and former fashion model.Sanda was born as Dominique Marie-Françoise Renée Varaigne in Paris to Lucienne and Gérard Varaigne...
and Leslie Caron
Leslie Caron
Leslie Claire Margaret Caron is a French film actress and dancer, who appeared in 45 films between 1951 and 2003. In 2006, her performance in Law and Order: Special Victims Unit won her an Emmy for guest actress in a drama series...
), Manuel Puig
Manuel Puig
Manuel Puig was an Argentine author...
's "Pubis Angelical", Adolfo Aristarain
Adolfo Aristarain
Adolfo Aristarain is an Argentine film director whom Variety has deemed a "master filmmaker."After leaving Argentina Aristarain started working as assistant director in the Arcente cinema, and then in Europe during his short exile for Mario Camus, Giorgio Stegani and Lewis Gilbert before...
's Lasts Days of the Victim and in the Cult classic
Cult Classic
Cult Classic is a Blue Öyster Cult studio recording released in 1994, containing remakes of many of the band's previous hits.-Track listing:# " The Reaper" - 5:05# "E.T.I...
Argentinian Black comedy
Black comedy
A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...
Esperando la carroza (Waiting for the Hearse) (1986).
In later years, she obtained wide critical and audience recognition for her recent performances as the Mother in Conversaciones con mamá in 2005 (2004 Best Actress Award Moscow Film Festival and the Málaga
Málaga
Málaga is a city and a municipality in the Autonomous Community of Andalusia, Spain. With a population of 568,507 in 2010, it is the second most populous city of Andalusia and the sixth largest in Spain. This is the southernmost large city in Europe...
Film Festival) and as Elsa, a peculiar old lady in the movie Elsa & Fred (2005) which won her several awards, including the Silver Condor for Best Actress.
Honors
She was awarded the Orden de Mayo by the Argentinian government and the Orden Gabriela MistralGabriela Mistral
Gabriela Mistral was the pseudonym of Lucila de María del Perpetuo Socorro Godoy Alcayaga, a Chilean poet, educator, diplomat, and feminist who was the first Latin American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, in 1945...
by the Chilean government and awards in her native country.
She was named "Illustrious Citizen" in Buenos Aires, Montevideo and other Argentinian cities and two theaters bears her name.
In 2008 she was made Knight (Chevalier) of the Légion d'honneur
Légion d'honneur
The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
by the French Government.
Filmography
- Tocar el cielo (2007) .... Imperio
- Elsa y FredElsa y FredElsa y Fred is a 2005 Spanish-Argentine film co-production directed by Marcos Carnevale and starring Manuel Alexandre, China Zorrilla and Federico Luppi.- Synopsis :...
(2005) .... Elsa - "Mujeres asesinas" .... Inés Quinteros (1 episode)
- Conversaciones con mamá (2004) .... Mamá
- "Roldán, Los" (2004) TV Series .... Mercedes Lozada (unknown episodes)
- "Piel naranja años después" (2004) TV Series .... Doña Elena
- "Son amoresSon AmoresSon amores was an Argentine telenovela originally broadcast between 2002-2003. It was produced by Pol-Ka Producciones & broadcast by Canal 13 in Argentina. Son amores was the most watched TV show in Argentina both in 2002 and in 2003....
" (2002) TV Series (uncredited) .... Margarita (2003) - "099 Central" (2002) TV Series (uncredited) .... Dora, Tomás' grandmother
- "Enamorarte" (2001) TV Series .... Mercedes 'Mechita' Dugan viuda de Juárez (unknown episodes)
- "Amantes, Las" (2001) TV Series
- "Gasoleros" (1998) TV Series .... Matilde (Mother of Roxana 'Roxy' Presutti)
- Sin querer (1997)
- "Arcángel, El" (1997) TV Series (unknown episodes)
- "Ricos y famosos" (1997) TV Series .... Catalina
- "R.R.D.T" (1997) TV Series .... Tina
- Entre la sombra y el alma (1997)
- Besos en la frenteBesos en la FrenteBesos en la frente is a 1996 Argentine drama film directed and written by Carlos Galettini about the love between a high-class old Grand-Dame and a young writer just arrived from the provinces to the great city ....
(1996) .... Mercedes Arévalo - La salud de los enfermos (1996)...Mamá
- Lola Mora (1996)
- Fotos del alma (1995) .... Esthercita
- Nave de los locos, La (1995) .... Dra. Marta Caminos
- "Leandro Leiva, un soñador" (1995) TV Series
- Guerriers et captives (1994)
- Cuatro caras para Victoria (1992) .... Victoria IV
- Peste, La (1992) .... Emma Rieux
- Dios los cría (1991)
- Verano del potro, El (1991) .... Ana
- "Atreverse" (1990) TV Series (unknown episodes)
- Nunca estuve en Viena (1989) .... Carlota
- Pobre mariposaPoor Butterfly (film)Poor Butterfly is a 1986 Argentine drama film directed by Raúl de la Torre. It was entered into the 1986 Cannes Film Festival.-Cast:* Graciela Borges as Clara* Lautaro Murúa* Pepe Soriano as Shloime* Víctor Laplace as Jose* Bibi Andersson as Gertrud...
(1986) - Esperando la carroza (1985) .... Elvira Romero
- Contar hasta diezCount to Ten (film)Count to Ten is a 1985 Argentine drama film directed by Oscar Barney Finn. It was entered into the 35th Berlin International Film Festival.-Cast:* Oscar Martínez* Héctor Alterio* Arturo Maly as Pedro Vallejos* María Luisa Robledo* Julia von Grolman...
(1985) - Darse cuenta (1984)
- Invitación, La (1982)
- Pubis Angelical (1982)
- Últimos días de la víctima (1982) .... Beba (Landlady)
- Señora de nadie (1982)
- "Solitario, El" (1980) (mini) TV Series .... Melani Duvalie
- Chau, amor mío" (1979) TV Series .... Ana
- "Que estamos solos, Los" (1976) TV Series .... Doña Barbarita
- Sorpresas, Las (1975) .... (segment "Corazonada")
- Gauchos judíos, Los (1975)
- "Piel naranja" (1975) TV Series .... Elena
- Triángulo de cuatro (1975)
- Tregua, La (1974)
- "Mi hombre sin noche" (1974) TV Series .... Casilda (April-August 1974)
- Venganzas de Beto Sánchez, Las (1973) .... La maestra
- "Pobre diabla" (1973) TV Series .... Doña Aída Morelli
- Heroína (1972)
- Maffia, La (1972) .... Assunta
- Tobogán, El (1971) (TV) .... Rosa
- Guapo del 900, Un (1971)