Cubavisión Premieres Documentary about Gina Cabrera on her 93rd Birthday

May 29, 2021

Gina, with screenplay and direction by audiovisual filmmaker Carlos Collazo, is the title of the documentary premiered on the Cubavisión channel, and has become a necessary approach to the very first actress Gina Cabrera, whom the public and critics identify as the Queen of Drama in Cuba upon reaching 93 years of age.

Said audiovisual investigates the fruitful artistic-professional trajectory of one of the most emblematic actresses in Cuban popular imagination, and consequently, discovers —through the interviewees with whom it interacts— the excellence of the inimitable performances, fundamentally in island radio and television, of the very Cuban artist, practically forgotten "in the lap of the gods," to the extent that not a few thought she had died.

With support from archival and recent images, characterized —fundamentally— by their aesthetic-artistic presentation, Collazo illustrates the testimonies recorded in the documentary, and to bring such a commendable task to safe harbor, the filmmaker, also a member of the Association of Cinema, Radio and Television of the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC), counted on the help of the Cuban Film Archive, and its director, M.Sc. Luciano Castillo, of Alejandro Delgado Cabrera, the actress's son, and actor Tony Delgado, who made available to the creator the personal files of the charismatic artist.

On the other hand, essential to the successful development of that audiovisual were the interventions of the very first actresses Verónica Lynn, National Television Prize winner, Carmen Solar, National Radio Prize winner, Diana Rosa Suárez, National Television Prize winner, Amada Morado, Teresita Rúa and Yaremis Pérez, as well as actors José Antonio Espinosa and Jorge Rivera, film critic Luciano Castillo and the award-winning designer Piedad Subirats, National Publishing Prize winner, whose testimonies provided an exact and precise vision of the commendable professional work carried out by Gina Cabrera in our main media outlets, which —I have not the slightest doubt— she honored with her stellar performance as an actress, director and vocalist, which has been recorded —in indelible letters— in the poetic memory of radio listeners and television viewers, who knew how to discover in her the ethical, patriotic, human and spiritual values that structure the multifaceted personality of that great lady of the Cuban stage and far beyond our geographical borders.

A moment marked by the deepest emotion for the filmmaker became the fact of sitting across from Gina Cabrera and exchanging with her some words, which constituted, in fact, "a [true] privilege reserved for very few people, […], especially in […] times of pandemic."

The spacious halls of the Ludwig Foundation of Cuba served as an ideal setting for the anecdotes and testimonies of the interviewees, who —along with the memorable performances of the Queen of Drama in Cuba, included in the archival materials— play a "key" role in the favorable reception that the public and specialized critics will surely give to the documentary Gina.

Luisa Georgina Cabrera Parada, better known and loved by all by her artistic name Gina Cabrera, celebrates this Friday, May 28th, her 93 years of life.

Talent and beauty together in a single name Gina Cabrera. This great artist who managed to win over her followers with her tenacity and effort in television, radio and theater, was also nicknamed the Queen of Drama in Cuba.

She was the face of so many adventures, soap operas and programs on the small screen in Cuba, that she is loved and respected by all from an era on the Island who knew how to transmit that affection for the actress to other generations. After 1959, along with other great Cubans, she founded the School of Training for Actors of the former Cuban Institute of Broadcasting, now the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television.