Shakespeare, Hollywood, and Mexico: The Cantinflas Romeo y Julieta
2002; Salisbury University; Volume: 30; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0090-4260
Autores Tópico(s)Media, Journalism, and Communication History
ResumoA version Romeo and Juliet which has so far received little attention is the wonderful parody made in Mexico in 1943, with Miguel M. Delgado directing the country's most popular comic Mario Moreno, known everywhere simply as Cantinflas.1 Outside Mexico, discussions Romeo y Julieta have appeared only in the context Cantinflas's career, most notably Jeffrey M. Pitcher's book Cantinflas and the Chaos Modernity. Luke McKernana and Olwen Terris do not have Romeo y Julieta in their book Walking Shadows, which lists Shakespeare in the British National Film and Television archives, and the film was unavailable to Kenneth S. Rothwell and Annabelle Henkin Melzer, whose comprehensive Shakespeare on Screen depends on reviews for a summary the film (250). Beside being an entertaining film with clever parodic elements, Romeo y Julieta demonstrates the intertextual nature film at a time when filmmakers could depend on an audience familiar with American films, and the and American film industries shared a complicated relationship bounded America's Good Neighbor Policy and the effect World War II on film production and distribution.2 From the beginning, American had a significant impact in Mexico, and, according to some estimates, by the mid- 1920s over 95 percent the offerings in Mexico's theatres were American films (Delpar 187), and in the 1930s, 76 percent the feature premiering in Mexico City were from America (Vega Alfaro 84).3 The coming World War II complicated the situation in ways that helped Mexico develop its film industry throughout the 1940s, ushering in the Golden Age cinema. Franklin D. Roosevelt's Good Neighbor Policy, introduced in 1936 to strengthen hemispheric relationships, became more important after Germany's 1939 invasion Poland and the threat Axis influence in Latin America. In October 1940, he appointed Nelson Rockefeller, head the newlycreated Office the Coordinator for Inter-American Affairs (CIAA), with John Hay Whitney, a financier Gone With the Wind and director the Museum Modern Art's film library, in charge the agency's Motion Picture Division (Usabel 157). Recognizing the value feature as propaganda, Rockefeller's CIAA, according to Seth Fein, was responsible for U.S. cultural and economic relations with Latin America during World War II> and became the most important of U.S.-Mexican interactions at a variety transnational and intergovernmental levels between the 1930s and 1950s (Myths 164).4 Beside improving the Latin image in American and encouraging American with Latin American topics, such as Disney's Saludos Amigos (1942) and The Three Caballeros (1943), as well as Orson Welles's unfinished It's All True (1942), the CIAA encouraged the exchange talent between Mexico and America and cut the delivery raw film stock to Axis-leaning Argentina while increasing the supply to Mexico.5 As a result, Argentinian film production declined in 1942; the next Mexico became the top producer in Latin America (Usabel 170-73) and Mexican features invaded the Latin American market (Usabel 185). In fact, 1943, the the Cantinflas Romeo y Julieta, produced many classics the cinema and has been called the industry's great year (Mora 59-60). Significantly, in terms the connection between Mexico and the United States, that same year. President Manuel Avila Camacho awarded Wait Disney its highest prize for furthering Pan-American relations (Usabel 166), and RKO Vice-President Phil Reisman, who was also a member the CIAA, tried to buy 51 percent Posa Films's shares and proposed that Cantinflas, their exclusive artist, make several in Hollywood (Mora 68). Mexico absorbed American and filmmaking in a variety ways. For example, a version Dracula was filmed at the same time and on the same set as Tod Browning's famous 1931 film starting Bela Lugosi. …
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