Antonio Emilio Vázquez Gallo

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Actor, playwright, narrator and one of the most prolific radio and television directors in Cuba. National Television Prize.

He was born in La Habana. He began his primary studies at a school in the Víbora neighborhood, in the capital, where he had his first contacts with theater.

In 1931, he traveled to Spain, and began his high school studies at the Academia Sueiro. During this period he became interested in amateur theater and wrote his first work, Aquellas palabras, in which he also acted and directed. Later, while studying at the Juventud Católica, he created the Teatro Misionero, a space where, in addition to acting and directing, he painted sets. Among the works performed are Fortunato, by the Quintero brothers and Todo un hombre, by Carlos Arniches.

He returned to Cuba in early 1937, and enrolled at the Instituto de la Víbora to complete the high school studies he had interrupted due to the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. After concluding his secondary education, he entered the Universidad de La Habana to study two degrees: Philosophy and Letters, which he abandoned after the first two years, and Pedagogy, from which he graduated in 1943.

The university period consolidated his vocation for theatrical arts. He was one of the first members of the Teatro Universitario, along with Guillermo Sánchez and Ramonín Valenzuela, among others. This academy, whose faculty was headed by Ludwig Shajowics, a prestigious Austrian theater director and student of Piscater and Max Reinhart in Germany, emerged in March 1941 within the School of Philosophy and Letters of the Universidad de La Habana. In the first production, Antígona, Vázquez Gallo took on the role of the elderly Tiresias; he was then 24 years old.

Years later, when Ludwig left for Puerto Rico to create a similar institution at the Universidad de Río Piedras, Vázquez Gallo assumed the direction of the group. His first work in this role was La Dama duende, by Calderón de la Barca, followed by Medea, by Euripides, with Violeta Casals in the lead role and La discreta enamorada, by Lope de Vega, which received awards from the Havana theater critics. In the years following their premieres, they were performed during a tour through Mexico and Guatemala. Among other works premiered were Las coéforas and Agamenón, by Aeschylus; Nuestra Natacha by Alejandro Casona; Iphigenia in Aulis and Hecuba, by Euripides; Tartufo, by Molière; Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice, by William Shakespeare; and Mary Stuart, by Friedrich von Schiller.

Vázquez Gallo also directed several works at the Academia Ruston, where he taught: A Fairy Tale and The King's Mailman, by Rabindranath Tagore are two examples.

His first foray into radio took place the same year of his return to Cuba, when he met Luís Aragón Dulzaides, a radio announcer, writer and director of the program Hora Múltiple, who held high positions at RHC Cadena Azul. Hora Múltiple presented theatrical works adapted for radio and interpreted by amateur actors. Vázquez Gallo worked in this group, under the artistic direction of Enriqueta Sierra until late 1937, when the program was unexpectedly taken off the air.

He returned to the medium in 1947, when Gaspar Pumarejo began searching for talents to inaugurate his own station, Unión Radio. Then, he was hired as director and actor, along with Roberto Garriga. Among the actors he directed during this period were Gina Cabrera and Margarita Balboa.

At the same time he was an advisor and later artistic director of the station's children's programs, such as Abuelita cuenta cuentos, El viejito Pulgarón and Kindergarten Musical (with songs by Cri-Cri, by Mexican Gabilondo Soler). His pedagogical training served him well in this work for which he was commissioned by María Julia Casanova, a station staff member.

He is the author of stories and theatrical works that were awarded by critics. For example: the stories Pan y costillas and El arique, which received Honorable Mention and Mention, respectively, in the 1948 international Alfonso Hernández Catá competition.

Likewise, Camorra and El niño inválido received the Patronato del Teatro award that same year and the first prize in the 1949 Ministry of Education competition, respectively. In 1950, the theatrical group of the Misiones Culturales of the Ministry of Education staged his drama El ladrón. Vázquez Gallo was also linked to the activities of the Sociedad Cultural Nuestro Tiempo.

In 1950, at the proposal of Gaspar Pumarejo, owner of Unión Radio y Televisión, Cuba's first television channel, he was hired as an actor and program director. He took over the direction of La Escuelita, the first regular dramatized program broadcast by television, which had a didactic focus aimed at children. He later directed the popular show of Spanish clowns titled Gaby, Fofó y Miliki, broadcast by remote control from the teatro Alkázar.

When the popular program moved to CMQ's programming, Vázquez Gallo suggested filling the time slot with Aventuras. The first series broadcast was El Hacha Escondida, and despite being made with a small budget and a new cast, it immediately achieved high acceptance and viewership ratings. Decades later, Vázquez Gallo would return to this genre to enrich it with his talent.

As an actor on the small screen he starred in La Cruz, one of the first dramatic programs on channel 4, under the direction of Cuqui Ponce de León; but he leaned more toward the production, direction and adaptation of literary and theatrical works. He ventured into almost all television genres. He also acted in Fotocrimen and Esta noche a las nueve, written by Marcos Behmaras, where he shared the screen with outstanding actors such as Reynaldo Miravalles, José Antonio Rivero, Vicente Revuelta and Rosa Felipe. Later he made Mi sombra y yo, by the same writer, with Pablo Medina as actor and narrator.

Among the first dramatized programs for adults directed by him in the first half of the fifties is Patio andaluz: a mixed program, with a script by Juan Herbello that combined sketches with Spanish music and was performed by Matilde Camejo and Manolo Tirado on guitar.

During this period his name is fundamentally linked to complex regular dramatic programs; such as Drama, Historias de Amor, Aventuras de Bob y Marieta, Su Programa Fab, El rostro del destino, and San Nicolás del Peladero, among others.

One of the greatest challenges he faced in the dramatized genre was El Gran Teatro del Sábado, sponsored by Cerveza Hatuey and broadcast on Channel 6, CMQ TV. This program disseminated the work of universal classics in live broadcasts, since videotape had not yet emerged. The program began with the performance of La sombra, by Darío Nicomedi, which was a notable success. The works had a duration of approximately an hour and a half, although there were performances that exceeded that time. Othello, for example, lasted 3 hours and 45 minutes, which is considered a record in Cuban Television. During its broadcast, a survey was conducted every quarter hour and the results showed that most of the audience had watched the work until the end. This feat earned Vázquez Gallo the Corona de Laurel awarded by the specialized critics of the magazine Carteles.

He was the director of the first varied musical program on rural culture on Cuban television, which emerged in the fifties, a precursor to the popular Palmas y Cañas of today.

He was a contributor to several of the most important periodicals of the time: Diario de la Marina, Carteles, Revista Salesciana, El País Gráfico and bohemia.

In 1959 he directed and co-wrote the feature film La vida comienza ahora. After that year, he was a programmer and artistic director of Channel 4 of television, while also directing theater productions for the ADAD group. In the early sixties, he returned to the adventure genre. From this period are remembered La isla del tesoro, El corsario negro, Los Bucaneros, and Los mambises, a series he directed for three years, with scripts by Carballido Rey.

With the expansion of the technological possibilities of Cuban television, he participated in the design of programming for the new national channels.

In 1961 he attended the First Congress of Writers and Artists of Cuba. Among other recognitions, he obtained the First Prize for Short Story in the La Edad de Oro competition with Nachito. He also served as a judge for short stories, theater and children's literature in the Caracol competitions; he was part of tribunals and artistic councils of television. He taught several postgraduate courses in Stage Direction for television, in the capital and in different provinces of the country; as well as Spanish grammar, Spanish versification, acting, framing and image production for cameramen.

Until the 1980s, he remained active in the production of plays, telenovelas, adventure programs and comedy shows for national television programming. He also continued directing programs aimed at children, among which Tía Tata cuenta cuentos is remembered.

In 1999, he was a founder of the Faculty of Radio, Film and Television of the Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA). He received the Raúl Gómez García decoration for National Culture and the Founder of the Teatro Universitario medal.

In 2001, he was nominated for the National Theater Prize and received the National Television Prize in its first edition, in 2003.

Antonio Vázquez Gallo died on January 8, 2007.