Vasco Santana
Vasco António Rodrigues Santana ( born January 28, 1898 in Lisbon, † June 13, 1958 ) was a Portuguese actor.
Career
Born in Lisbon district of Benfica, he began early to be interested in theater. After a first appearance in a small piece at the Teatro Avenida in 1917, he received more roles, and he abandoned his architectural and art studies. After a series of engagements, among others, at the Teatro São Luiz and Brazil - drama travels, he played in the 1933 film comedy A Canção de Lisboa. It was the first film in only Portuguese production and was a box office success. The film established a shaft up today popular comedies of the 1930s to 1950s, in which Santana with castmates as Beatriz Costa, António Silva Ribeirinho and particularly entertained a wide audience with sparkling wit. They all came from the Revue, and so was Santana trained to sing, improvise, and cheerful entertainment to present with more specific acting skills. So were films such as O Pai Tirano ( " The tyrannical father ", directed by António Lopes Ribeiro ), O Pátio the Cantigas ( "backyard of Songs", 1942, directed by Ribeirinho ) or Fado, História d' uma Cantadeira ( " Fado, Geschichter a singer ", 1947, with Amália Rodrigues, director: Perdigão Queiroga ) ever-popular classic. In an effort to be included in the newly created United Nations, the Salazar regime in 1952 launched a campaign to reduce the high illiteracy rate in the country. For this Vasco Santana as an actor for the character of Zé Analfabeto (Eng. about Fritz illiterate ) was engagaiert who campaigned in 6 short films by director Carlos Marques for the national campaign of adult education.
The Portuguese cinema was located since the early '50s in the progressive decline, and Santana was now able to offer more and more rare as successful film roles as before. He continued to play at the theater until he died in his hometown in 1958.
Reception
Santana display good-natured, fun-loving and comical characters were one of the constants of the successful Portuguese comedy and tragedy comedies of the 30s to 50s. With authoritarian Estado Novo distance to the regime or with artistic demands of the entertainment of the audience, he is not known. But the representation of popular figures made him, thanks to felicitous wordplay and convincing actor's performance, the up to now best known and most popular Portuguese actor, along with Antonio Silva. His special popularity grew it from the amiable, folksy and laugh at yourself itself being able people, the public saw in him. Some of his movie quotes were received in the common usage in Portugal, as in O Pátio Cantigas since his call as a drunken man with a nighttime street lamp and his provocative word jokes with him his hostile father, played by António Silva. He was then, as now used as a popular advertising medium and again honored with dedicated to him plays and television retrospectives. Even Portuguese streets and theaters were named after him.