Carmen Martin |
Madrid (EFE).- Among stunning ‘stars’, Lina Morgan, “with an average physique”, went from the last row of the stage to a successful artist with her own theater who burst the box office making an audience laugh that little (or not at all) ) knew about his most intimate side, his loves, his fears or his loneliness, as reflected in a documentary series that arrives on Movistar Plus+ on Monday.
“Lina Morgan did not have a ‘star’ physique, but her humor and her work led her to become a principal dancer and the first European woman to have her own theater,” Israel del Santo, director of the documentary series ‘Lina’, tells EFE. on Movistar Plus+ since Monday.
The life of the protagonist of the film ‘The Silly Boat’ articulates a three-chapter documentary in which, in addition to paying tribute to her, it provides a transversal vision of a woman ahead of her time who knew how to preserve her private life.
“Lina’s work has been buried by four little things like her sexual orientation or her heritage,” adds Del Santo, who vindicates Lina Morgan’s artistic side.
That is what the more than 50 artists who take part in the documentary also value, among them Manuela Velasco or Silvia Abril, who imitate her, and others, such as Bárbara Rey or Lolita Flores, who remember her figure, to which are added the director Lluis Pasqual or producer Jesús Cimarro.
Lina Morgan (Madrid 1936-2015) was born into a humble family. Her father, Emilio, worked in a tailor shop; Her mother, Julia, raised her five children: Emilio, Julio, Julia, Lina and José Luis.
His brother José Luis was his life partner. Together they collected cardboard and then greened it and went to the movies. “I was drooling when I saw the artists,” Lina Morgan told Terenci Moix in an interview in 1989.
At the age of 16 he made his debut in a nightclub. Then came the chotis ‘El pichi’, dressed as a man and smoking, “quite a transgression for the time,” says Del Santo, who remembers that her rise to fame occurred with Juanito Navarro, where she caused laughter by crossing her legs. in an exaggerated way.
He lived through the era of exposure. “I have never undressed (…) It is not because I am prude, my way of being requires it that way,” said Lina Morgan.
Audiences of more than twenty million viewers on television, fourteen films and many afternoons at the theater made her the leading figure of entertainment in Spain. In 1975 she set up her own company.
He bought the La Latina theater for 127 million (about 763,000 euros). “She wanted to be the owner of her own work,” says Jesús Cimarro, current owner of this Madrid theater.
The day her father died, the actress did not cancel the performance. It was the premiere of ‘What a pair of twins’. “It’s not people’s fault that my father died,” said Lina Morgan, who lived for her audience.
He did 14 shows a week, two a day and sometimes three. With ‘Hostal Royal Manzanares’ she became the highest-paid actress in Spain: 32 million pesetas (192,320 euros) per episode.
During that filming he was diagnosed with cancer. She didn’t say it. With barely any strength he carried out the last project that his brother had signed for him. “She was his right-hand man,” says Del Santo.
The death of José Luis, who was suffering from AIDS, was a blow for Morgan. “It was a shock, he didn’t know what to do, how to react, and he decided to hide his death for months,” says Del Santo.
Your love life
Lesbian or straight? Little is known about her loves. “Because she was a woman, had short hair and was successful, they thought she had to have something dark,” says Del Santo.
“I don’t know if she was a lesbian or not, but it has been mentioned,” says Bárbara Rey, who believes that Lina Morgan was afraid that the public, upon knowing it, would stop loving her.
After a teenage love with Manolo Zarzo, she had her first boyfriend, José Luis, son of a wealthy family who opposed the wedding because the bride was “a showgirl with no money.”
Then soccer players and bullfighters arrived. Also two married men: the film producer Julián Esteban and the bullfighting businessman José Martínez Uranga, “of whom he always carried a photo in his wallet,” says Del Santo.
“I am not a woman of many loves. I am faithful for almost all things in my life. I have not broken up any family, says Lina Morgan in an interview that she includes in the documentary.
He also had a love with Pepe Sacristán, “but there was never that commitment that we would have a little paper house,” says the actor in one of the chapters.
“He compared all men to his father and brother, he looked for a partner who was like both of them. Comparisons are never good,” concludes his biographer Jesús García Orts.
Lina Morgan died alone. Her universal heir was her driver and right-hand man, Daniel Pontes.
