The Piscolabis
If you are polite they always answer your questions. Like that followingnoon that aspired to be a Gala night. The Vitoria-Gasteiz Television Festival was growing and in that edition they had had the great idea of inviting José Luis López Vázquez, a film, theater and small screen actor. It looked like he was dressed for a wedding. Or for a funeral. His face gave us no clues. Behind the faces, almost always, dramas are hidden. We did not know then that that genius had a sad childhood. For this reason, this week, which marks the 100th anniversary of his birth, I remember the day I met José Luis López Vázquez. Because of what he told me and what he kept to himself.
It was the year 99 and everyone was looking towards the new century that was looming through the door. All the past seemed dandruff to us. Or not. Despite the charm of the XXI, it was enough to touch the fabric of that feeling called nostalgia for yesterday to seem like longing. Or at least cute. For what we went and especially for what we saw. That year I worked as a server on TV and I had to cover the Vitoria-Gastez Festval. Others went for the famous premieres. Us, for the tribute to the man known as ‘The Godfather’. But not Brando, but José Luis. The one who distributed gifts and complaints in the immense Great Family of Closas and Soler Leal. At home we were three brothers. Much of what the film told me was far away. But that guy had a lot of truth. And despite my young age, when I saw him for the first time, I felt him close and real. The character of López Vázquez had much of his life. He told me that he had been a sad, lonely child, that his father left home when he was barely able to reason, and that he grew up with his mother, his grandmother, and a single uncle he did. from father A kind of godfather. Perhaps that is why I remember that he seemed to me a man as polite as he was serious. I know many comedians and they are like that. And he was funny in capital letters. The actor thing was too small for him. People are wrong. It’s easier to do drama than comedy. But López Vázquez, like others, only achieved recognition when he played “serious roles.” I’m talking regarding movies like ‘My Dear Miss’, ‘The Forest of the Wolf’ or ‘Peppermin Frapé’.
Now it is known that George Cukor wanted to take him to Hollywood and that he considered him “the best actor in the world.” He didn’t leave. José Luis said that he was for the English. But I sense there was something more. That behind was the child that was. The one he carried with a sadness that he hid in some movies. But that, paradoxes of life, gave him recognition and awards when he showed her in dramatic characters. It is 100 years since his birth. I told you that day in 1999 and I tell you today. Thank you López Vázquez for helping the memories of those who type these lines today remain full of nostalgia. For those days seeing the godfather of a family as huge as simple. One that doesn’t matter how many members it has. It will look like everyone. That family was not that of Amparo Soler Leal and Alberto Closas. It was mine. Yours, everyone’s. Reflection of as many generations as those who grew up contemplating his art. López Vázquez was a genius who, like many, was labeled by critics as a man with a mustache who was chasing Swedish women. It is the price of living in a world where we value the packaging more than the gift. Although some of us resist. José Luis López Vázquez had a tilde in his compound name and in his two surnames. And yet where he left his accent was in a movie theater that owes him so much that he might never pay it back. Not only because of the more than 200 movies, series and plays. If Spielberg managed to make me afraid to go into the water, Mercero made me never close the door of a telephone booth. The architect was the director. But there was someone else. Lopez Vazquez. A century ago he was born. And it is an important date. Because the man dressed in black that I met at that festival didn’t say much and he told me everything. What fits in a life of a person with thousands of characters. A century has passed since the birth of man, but there is no death date for an immortal genius.
