I have been a wretch, always absorbed. I think it is a condition of my childhood and of my social conditions”, affirms a late José Luis López Vázquez in the documentary about his life – José Luís López Vázquez. What nonsense! –, exclamation that reproduces the answer he gave to his only son, José Luis, when he proposed the project to him.
“I dare to say that he has been the best Spanish actor of his generation. There have been very great ones, Fernán Gómez, for example, but in all the films it was Fernán Gómez. José Luis López Vázquez is each character in each moment”, emphasizes the director of the film, Roberto Oltra, presented in Barcelona at the Phenomena cinema – nest of cinephiles – and viewable on Movistar.
By virtue of seeing his films, 262 films shot, with a plus mark in 1967 (12), López Vázquez became part of the family, which seemed to detract from his merits.
Four romantic unions, four children, and the typical abandonment of family functions because he said yes to all job offers. “He dared with everything, and he was able with everything that came his way”, highlights Oltra. On the contrary, “social empathy was not his forte”, comments one of his friends on the tape.
“He lacked time and he lacked aptitude as a father – commented, with affection, José Luis López -. I have few memories of it, maybe on January 5, the cavalcade. We went to the cinema a lot on Sunday afternoons and he was prone to falling asleep”.
The childhood she talks about was a grandmother and a mother who, as it sounds, did not want to move to Teruel with her husband, a prison official. “I don’t move from Madrid”, he added. She was modest. Some happy memory: the movie evenings “at the palaus de les pipes”, modest theaters in republican Madrid.
“He worked during the war in the pharmacy section of the Ministry of War, which was controlled by Santiago Carrillo. In 1939 he lost his position. And he never expressed himself politically. He did not sign any manifesto in his life. Nor did he respond to invitations to Pardo (where the Francos watched films one or two afternoons a week in a private room). My father was very tight-lipped about it. I guess he wanted to forget”, recalls José Luis López.
What was called an apolitical…
Debut in the cinema by chance in María Fernanda, la Jerezana, in which he replaced an extra. Only eight seconds, the time of a Chaplin-style cream, and the director, Enrique Herreros, told him that he should not dedicate himself to the costumes – he drew very well -, but to the interpretation.
A decisive blow was the night when, late, he received a call from a colleague to go to the Gijón café to introduce him to Bardem and Berlanga, who might be offering him a role. Hence the splendid appearance in ¡Vivan los novios! , where he works as a salesman for Galerias Preciados with the main couple (Fernán Gómez and Elvira Quintilla). Here the screenwriter, Rafael Azcona, summed it up: “This is my actor”. And so it was – there is no Berlanga without the Austro-Hungarian Empire or López in the cast.
“Azcona saw the Spanish condition”, points out Roberto Oltra. “It was very bad not to be the protagonist of El verdugo (1963) for the rest of his life, because he knew it would be a great film. Berlanga and Azcona (director and screenwriter) thought of him from the beginning, but since it was a co-production, the Italians imposed Nino Manfredi and López Vázquez got the role of the brother”, Oltra points out. Berlanga, one of the actor’s best friends, like Alberto Closas, always said that with López Vázquez the film would have been better…
The face was La cabina, the best short film in Spanish cinema. Overwhelmed with work, he turned down the role without reading the script. “In the end, since he didn’t socialize very much during the filming, he took a look at him while he was waiting and immediately realized his potential. He ordered his agent to empty his schedule anyway because he wanted that paper.” And it brought him the indisputable recognition of a great actor, so opposed to the populist comedies of the time.
His consecration was daring with the first Saura, a fire test passed (Peppermint frappé, followed by El jardín de las delicias and La prima Angélica). “You approach López Vázquez’s eyes with a camera and it’s the world. They tell you the story with their eyes”, they highlight in the documentary. And I swear they prove it on tape.
