Orlando David Cruzata Montero

Cuban audiovisual director, director of programs for Cuban Television.

He is the creator of the Lucas program and the Lucas Awards, the most important event in Cuban music videos, which brings together all the work of creators in this audiovisual genre and awards the best music videos of the year.

The Lucas Awards emerged in 1997 under the direction and magic of the artist to become a coveted trophy due to the seriousness with which these awards are presented and for constituting an anticipated and recognized musical showcase of excellence for all the people of Cuba. Orlando Cruzata can be considered a successful and tireless creator, as he is today a proven promoter and defender of Cuban music videos and the country's potential in this artistic expression.

He has been the director of television programs such as En confianza, El sonido subterráneo, El patio de mi casa es... (the Lucas program) and Espacio reservado, among others.

It was a great-aunt who guided his steps to begin working in television in 1981. He started there as a set design assistant, in props. While working in television itself, he became involved with the humorous group Nos y Otros, which was founded in 1982 at the University of Havana, made up of four people, to which he was linked for 15 years.

He joined the group through a friend because he had a small group of enthusiasts at the ICRT who performed some acts at what is now the Estudio de Sono Caribe studio, and seeing him convinced him to come down to a gathering they had at the Casa del Joven Creador in 1985-1986. That same year he became a props manager and became more involved in the world of filmmaking.

In 1985 they began to perform at the Guiñol, at the gatherings of the Teatrova, alongside Santiago Feliú, Carlos Varela, Gerardo Alfonso and Frank Delgado, and recruited new actors for the group, such as Octavio Rodríguez Churrisco (Churrisco) and Orlando Cruzata.

Beginnings in music video
At first he was more attracted to documentaries and short films, as music videos didn't capture his attention as much. He began making En confianza in 1988-1989. He spent a good amount of time as an assistant with Raysa White on Entre nosotros, and learned a lot from her there.

At that time, he saw music video as something for those who liked to experiment. In 1987 the video workshop of the Asociación Hermanos Saíz was created, which has its headquarters in the Pabellón Cuba, and he was placed in charge of that workshop with the responsibility of managing the cameras. That allowed him to help make some music videos from the 1980s, for Camilo Hernández, the 'Gago', Juancho, people who made music videos in that decade."

His first music video was with Rudy Mora where he made María Magdalena, with whom he has continued working to the present day, creating more than 100 music videos. Rudy is united with him through great friendship and aesthetic affinity.

He completed his pre-university studies with very good results and although he felt inclined toward careers in Art History and Medicine, he enrolled at the Instituto Superior de Cultura Física Manuel Fajardo, which he did not complete.

He completed editing studies at the ICRT and in 1989 he entered the Film, Radio and Television Direction program at FAMCA (Faculty of Art of Audiovisual Media) of the Instituto Superior de Arte, where he graduated five years later (1994).

Lucas Program
In 1997, Orlando Cruzata came up with the idea of proposing, in a coherent and regular way for television, a program to promote Cuban music videos, and thus Lucas was born. Cruzata had already made a good number of music videos with Rudy Mora and in that particular drive for research, had viewed hundreds of them from all over the world.

The Lucas Awards or Lucas is a Cuban Television project created by Cruzata that includes the Lucas program and the awards that aim to stimulate the production of Cuban music videos, awarding creativity and originality in each competing genre, while also promoting and publicizing Cuban music videos at both national and international levels.

Cruzata incorporated into his audiovisual work what he learned from Nos y Otros and vice versa. Editing on TV, in video, gave him the sense of editing spectacle in theater and the proper use of set design.

The Lucas space carries an important dose of humor, with satire and absurdity in the midst of an innovative design environment, in constant visual innovation and transgression; it doesn't have the typical hosting and presentation of television programs. All of that is also Nos y Otros.

The Lucas Awards broke with everything that was being done on television, from the clothing of the hosts to the innovative camera movement in the program itself. Lucas later multiplied across several channels: Lucas plus on Multivisión and Lucasnómetro on the Educational Channel.

Cruzata's Quotes

Cruzata from the trenches of the Lucas Awards defends Cuban music videos tooth and nail.
The Name of Lucas
I spent about a year living in Spain, and there was a humorous character named Lucas and I would laugh with him. When I came to Cuba and began with the effort of promoting music videos, one day I said to the program's host at that time: "Look man, why don't you say when you say goodbye: 'See you later, Lucas'". A week later there were about seven or eight people calling, asking who Lucas is, what Lucas is. Well, we later conceptualized it: Lucas has to be that, the possibility of creating, the possibility that Cuban music video has a space, a name, a quality, respect… If you develop the music video, you're developing the discography, you're developing music, you're promoting it and Cuban culture is enriched.

The Importance of the Popularity of Lucas
We're talking about a music video program that's made to promote a musician, an image, even a director, because Lucas from its beginnings gave great importance to this figure. So, regarding popularity, a music video program in Cuba has to be popular. Let's not forget that we're on the Island of music. Now, the question of whether more or fewer people watch it depends on many things.

Details of Lucas
The aesthetics of the project influence a lot. In our case we have been consistent throughout these 11 years, in the face of detractors and supporters. For example, it was never popular for a presenter to appear on screen dressed in black with dark glasses because it was an obstacle to communication. With that code we broke the mold and people have accepted it. And that is a code of Lucas.

Lucas: A Thermometer of Cuban Identity
When we're going to do Lucas we look for Cuba and Cubans to be represented. We have a principle and it is that "long live Cuba". Perhaps that's why I don't understand why so much space is dedicated to foreign music on our television, when as you browse foreign channels, Cuban content is not there. Similarly, there is a programming policy based on Fidel Castro's words to intellectuals in the sixties: "Everything within the Revolution, nothing against the Revolution". And I add the Martian phrase: "With all and for the good of all". That is the policy we must adhere to, because Lucas is not a program separate from the ICRT.

Barriers to Cuban Music Video
The problems are no longer so much in the lack of technology but in its distribution. Music videos are not transmitted the necessary number of times for them to function and fulfill their role. The most popular video of the year is transmitted on our TV, at most, 15 times a year. In terms of promotion that is nothing. Given the level Cuban videos have reached, the clip needs more air time. That phenomenon even slows down video production, because many record labels don't want to invest in a music video since it won't be distributed enough afterward.

Cultured Television
The other day I was in a meeting and they were asking why classical music doesn't appear more on television. Television is not for high culture, television should have moments of high culture. There might perhaps be a channel (when there are twenty or thirty channels, or cable television, which exist everywhere), like there's a channel for animals, for stories… But television that reaches seven or eight million people cannot be exclusively for talents. There have to be moments of triviality, political moments…. Because all of that is culture.
Where's the crux of the matter? In doing it well. You can make a banal program, but you have to do it well, it has to have balance, it can't go toward bad taste, toward vulgarity, toward taking the easy way out…… The thing is to sit down and think about how our television, which is already cultured television, or at least has a tendency to be so and not commercial, can be less boring; yes because there are very good programs but they are boring, they are not attractive, they are blocks, however they are very interesting programs, what they lack is a bit of craft.

Orlando Cruzata