Dolores del Río

María de los Dolores Asúnsolo y López Negrete (3 August 1904 – 11 April 1983), known professionally as Dolores del Río , was a Mexican actress. With a career spanning more than 50 years, she is regarded as the first major female Latin American crossover star in Hollywood.

After being discovered in Mexico, she began her film career in Hollywood in 1925. She had roles in a string of successful films, including Resurrection (1927), Ramona (1928) and Evangeline (1929). Del Río came to be considered a sort of feminine version of Rudolph Valentino, a 'female Latin Lover', in her years during the American silent era.

With the advent of sound, she acted in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to musical comedies and romantic dramas. Her most successful films of that decade include Bird of Paradise (1932), Flying Down to Rio (1933) and Madame Du Barry (1934). In the early 1940s, when her Hollywood career began to decline, Del Río returned to Mexico and joined the Mexican film industry, which at that time was at its peak.

When del Río returned to her native country, she became one of the more important stars of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema. A series of Mexican films starring Del Rio are considered classic masterpieces and helped boost Mexican cinema worldwide. Of them stands out the critically acclaimed María Candelaria (1943). Del Río remained active mainly in Mexican films throughout the 1950s. In 1960 she returned to Hollywood. During the next years she appeared in Mexican and American films. From the late 1950s until the early 1970s she also successfully ventured into theater in Mexico and appeared in some American TV series.

Del Río is considered a quintessential representation of the female face of Mexico in the world.

Early life and education

Commemorative plaque at the house where Dolores del Río was born, located in Durango City, Mexico. It reads: Dolores del Rio. In the history of photography there are two perfect faces: hers and Greta Garbo's María de los Dolores Asúnsolo y López Negrete was born in Victoria de Durango, Mexico on 3 August 1904, Del Río always projected a special elegance with her beauty, more than just a 'Latin bombshell' such as other actresses like Lupe Vélez. Del Rio's intrinsic elegance was apparent even off-screen. Del Río strongly identified with her Mexican heritage despite her growing fame and her transition to 'modernity'. She also felt strongly about being able to play Mexican roles and bemoaned the fact that she was not cast in them. She never relinquished her Mexican citizenship and said in 1929 (at the height of her popularity) that she wanted "to play a Mexican woman and show what life in Mexico really is. No one has shown the artistic side – nor the social".

Del Río was considered one of the prototypes of female beauty in the 1930s. In 1933, the American film magazine Photoplay conducted a search for "the most perfect female figure in Hollywood", using the criteria of doctors, artists and designers as judges. The 'unanimous choice' of these selective arbiters of female beauty was Del Río. The question posed by the search for the magazine and the methodology used to find 'the most perfect female figure' reveal a series of parameters that define femininity and feminine beauty at that particular moment in US history. Larry Carr (author of the book More Fabulous Faces) said Del Río's appearance in the early 1930s influenced Hollywood. Women imitated her style of dress and makeup. A new kind of beauty occurred, and Del Río was the forerunner. She is also considered the pioneer of the two piece swimsuit.

According to Austrian-American filmmaker Josef von Sternberg, stars such as Del Río, Marlene Dietrich, Carole Lombard and Rita Hayworth helped him to define his concept of glamour in Hollywood.

When Del Río returned to Mexico, she radically changed her image. In Hollywood, she had lost ground to the modernity of the faces. In Mexico, she had the enormous fortune that filmmaker Emilio Fernández emphasized her Mexican indigenous features. She did not come to Mexico as the Hollywood 'Latin bombshell' transforming her makeup to highlight her indigenous features. Del Río defied the change that her appearance suffered in her native country: "I took off my furs and diamonds, satin shoes and pearl necklaces; all swapped by the shawl and bare feet."

Del Río's contemporaries comment about her image: Del Río is considered a pioneer on wearing the two piece swimsuit later known as the bikini. Here she is posing in a publicity photograph for the film In Caliente (1935) while wearing this type of garment

American actress Joan Crawford: "Dolores became, and remains, as one of the most beautiful stars in the world".

German-American actress and singer Marlene Dietrich: "Dolores del Río was the most beautiful woman who ever set foot in Hollywood". "Ah, this is the real beauty. We blondes have to work at it".

Fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli: "I have seen many beautiful women in here, but none as complete as Dolores del Río!"

Mexican painter Diego Rivera: "The most beautiful, the most gorgeous of the west, east, north and south. I'm in love with her as 40 million Mexicans and 120 million Americans who can't be wrong".

Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes: "Garbo and Dietrich were women turned into goddesses. Del Río was a goddess about being a woman".

American photographer Jerome Zerbe: "Dolores del Río and Marlene Dietrich are the most beautiful women I've ever photographed".

Russian-American photographer George Hoyningen-Huene: "The bone structure of her head and body is magnificent. Her skin is like ripe fruit".

Australian-American costume designer Orry-Kelly: "I draped her naked body in jersey. She wanted no underpinnings to spoil the line. When I finished draping her she became a Greek goddess as she walked close to the mirror and said, It is beautiful. Gazing into the mirror, she said in a half-whisper, Jesus, I am beautiful. Narcissistic? Probably yes, but she was right. She looked beautiful".

Mexican cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa: "I have had great beauties in front of my camera. But the facial bones of Dolores del Río are incomparable. That has been said many times. What has not been said is that she had a privileged smooth skin, a beautiful brown color and a body really perfect".

Del Río herself commented on her face and image: "Take care of your inner beauty, your spiritual beauty, and that will reflect in your face. We have the face we created over the years. Every bad deed, every bad fault will show on your face. God can give us beauty and genes can give us our features, but whether that beauty remains or changes is determined by our thoughts and deeds."

In 1952, she was awarded the Neiman Marcus Fashion Award and was called the "best-dressed woman in America".

Relationships Del Río married Jaime Martínez del Río in 1921. Her marriage ended in 1928. The differences between the couple emerged after settling in Hollywood. In Mexico she had been the wife of Jaime Martinez del Río, but in Hollywood Jaime became husband of a movie star. The trauma of a miscarriage added to the marital difficulties and del Río was advised not to have children. After a brief separation, Dolores filed for divorce. Six months later, she received news that Jaime had died in Germany.

In 1930, del Río met Cedric Gibbons, an art director at MGM and one of the most influential men in Hollywood, at a party at Hearst Castle. The couple began a romance and finally married on August 6, 1930. The del Rio-Gibbons were one of the most famous couples of Hollywood in the early thirties. They organized 'Sunday brunches' in their Art Deco house at 757 Kingman Avenue in the Rustic Canyon neighborhood of Pacific Palisades. Many celebrities would attend and play tennis or swim in the pool including Marlene Dietrich, Greta Garbo, Gary Cooper and Cary Grant. The couple divorced in 1941. Del Río alleged before the judge in her divorce that her relationship with her husband had become cold and distant due to their work commitments.

In 1949 she met the American millionaire Lewis A. Riley in Acapulco. Riley was known in the Hollywood cinema in the forties for being a member of the Hollywood Canteen, an organization created by movie stars to support relief efforts in World War II. At that time Riley was engaged in a torrid affair with Bette Davis. Del Río and Riley started a romance. In 1959, the couple married in New York after ten years of relationship. They remained together until her death in 1983. writer Erich Maria Remarque, film producer Archibaldo Burns, and actor Tito Junco. Mexican filmmaker Emilio Fernández was one of her admirers. He said that he had appeared as an extra in several films of del Río in Hollywood just to be near her. The beauty and elegance of del Río had impressed him deeply. Fernández said: "I fell in love with her, but she always ignored me. I adored her ... really I adored her."

Orson Welles

Del Río met actor and filmmaker Orson Welles at a party organized by Darryl Zanuck. The couple felt a mutual attraction and began a discreet affair. Welles had been infatuated with her since adolescence. He declared: "That's when I fell in love with her". He later said: "She changed my life". After del Río filed for divorce, she threw herself into Welles's chaotic world, considering his intellect "second to none, not even Shakespeare." Welles was equally complimentary. "She lives so graciously. Everyone around her loves her. She is the one girl you can be with and not feel the need for conversation. She has a mind full of talk, though, when she wants". Throughout the filming of Citizen Kane, del Río was often at the difficult Welles's side, soothing him when he banged his head against the wall and dealing with his insomnia as he abused Dexedrine. Rebecca Welles, the daughter of Welles and Hayworth, expressed her desire to travel to Mexico to meet Dolores on her 18th birthday. In 1962, Dolores received her at her home in Acapulco. After their meeting, Rebecca said: "My father considered Dolores the great love of his life. She is a living legend in the history of my family." According to Rebecca, until the end of his life, Welles felt for del Río a kind of obsession. For the rest of her life del Río kept a card with two beautiful slanted eyes (easily identifiable as Dolores's own) and a dove drawing along a banner inscribed with the word "always" and signed "Orson". But the prestige of del Río was known and respected, and Vélez could not ignore this. Vélez was popular, had many friends and devoted fans, but was not accepted in the same Hollywood circles as del Río. Vélez spoke ill of del Río, but del Río never mentioned her name in an offensive way.

There was media speculation about a strong rivalry between del Río and María Félix, another successful Mexican film actress. The novelist Carlos Fuentes portrayed del Río and Félix as aging sisters in his 1982 play (Orchids in the Moonlight). The fictionalized version of Félix calls del Río "chased but not chaste" in a reference to the latter's involvement with Orson Welles. Félix said in her autobiography: "With Dolores I don't have any rivalry. On the contrary. We were friends and we always treated each other with great respect. We were completely different. She [was] refined, interesting, soft on the deal, and I'm more energetic, arrogant and bossy".

Final years and death

In 1978, she was diagnosed with osteomyelitis. Del Río used to give herself vitamin injections periodically. One of the syringes is believed to have been contaminated and was diagnosed with hepatitis C in 1981. It is said that the day she died, an invitation to attend the Oscars was sent to her. located in the same cemetery and where the remains are found of some of the most outstanding Mexican personalities of art and culture.

Legacy

Del Río was the first Mexican actress to succeed in Hollywood. In her wake others followed including Lupe Vélez and Katy Jurado. In recent years, other Mexican stars that have achieved a place in Hollywood include Salma Hayek, and Eiza González.

In art and literature The physical characteristics of del Río made her a figure of veneration even beyond death. From a young age, del Río had the intelligence to know how to surround herself with personalities of the intellectual environment. The Hollywood myth placed del Río in another area, as she became one of the women related to the renaissance of Mexican culture and customs.

The face of del Río was also the object of veneration for many artists who shaped her image on their canvases. In 1916, when del Río was 11 years old, she was first portrayed by Alfredo Ramos Martínez, a very popular artist among Mexican high society. In the 1920s, del Río was also embodied in the canvases of Mexican painters Roberto Montenegro and Ángel Zárraga. In 1938, the actress was portrayed by her close friend, the famous Mexican artist Diego Rivera. The portrait was made in New York. It was del Río's favorite portrait and occupied a special place in her home in Mexico. Rivera also captured the image of del Río in some of his paintings and murals, highlighting La vendedorea de flores, La pollera and La Creacion.

In 1941, del Río was also portrayed by the famous Mexican muralist José Clemente Orozco. The portrait was made at the request of Orson Welles. Unfortunately, when the artist painted the portrait he was already losing his sight. Del Río said: "He painted his tragedy on my face!" Although the portrait was not liked by the actress, it had a very important place in her home. Other artists who recorded her image in her paintings were Miguel Covarrubias, Rosa Rolanda, Antonieta Figueroa, Frances Gauner Goshman, Adolfo Best Maugard and John Carroll.

In 1970, the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, the Asociación Nacional de Actores, the Humane Society of the Artistic Treasures of Mexico and the Motion Picture Export Association of America paid her a tribute titled Dolores del Rio in the Art in which her main portraits and a sculpture by Francisco Zúñiga were exhibited. Dolores del Río statue in the Chapultepec Park in Mexico City.

In her will, del Río stipulated that all her artworks be donated to the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura of Mexico, for display in various museums in Mexico City, including the National Museum of Art, the Museum of Art Carillo Gil and the Diego Rivera & Frida Kahlo House-Studio.

Del Río was the model of the statue of Evangeline, the heroine of Longfellow's romantic poem located in St. Martinville, Louisiana. The statue was donated by del Río, who played Evangeline in the 1929 film.

Poet Salvador Novo wrote her a sonnet and translated all her stage plays. She inspired Jaime Torres Bodet's novel La Estrella de Día (Star of the Day), published in 1933, which chronicles the life of an actress named "Piedad". Vicente Leñero was inspired by del Río to write his book, Señora. Carlos Pellicer also wrote her a poem in 1967. Other authors who wrote her poems were Xavier Villaurrutia, Celestino Gorostiza and Pita Amor. Carlos Monsiváis and Jorge Ayala Blanco also made her a tribute book on the occasion of the Ibero-American Film Festival of Huelva, in 1983. The book contains an essay by Monsiváis entitled Responsibilities of a face. Vicente Leñero also pays tribute to the book Señora.

Carlos Fuentes wrote (Orchids in the Moonlight), his 1982 play depicting del Río and María Félix as sisters, in both English and Spanish. He began the drafting process in Spanish before certain jokes, as well as an American character named the Fan, lent themselves to English. According to a contemporary reviewer, "The fact that Dolores Del Rio herself transcended affiliation with a single country to become a universal symbol provides the bilingual/bicultural model on which this drama is based." The Chicago Reader nonetheless called the two stars "barely known in the United States anymore" in 1991 and questioned whether young audiences were familiar with either.

After her death, her photo archive was given to the Carso Center for the Study of Mexican History by Lewis Riley.

Memorials

She has her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1630 Vine Street in recognition of her contributions to the motion picture industry. Dolores del Río also has a statue at Hollywood-La Brea Boulevard in Los Angeles, designed by Catherine Hardwicke built to honor the multi-ethnic leading ladies of the cinema together with Mae West, Dorothy Dandridge and Anna May Wong. Del Río has also a mural painted on the east side of Hudson Avenue just north of Hollywood Boulevard painted by the Mexican-American artist Alfredo de Batuc. Del Río is one of the entertainers displayed in the mural "Portrait of Hollywood", designed in 2002 by the artist Eloy Torrez in the Hollywood High School. Del Río's memory is honored in three monuments in Mexico City. The first is a statue located in the second section of Chapultepec Park. The other two are busts. One is located in the Parque Hundido. and the other is in the nursery that bears her name. In Durango, Mexico, her hometown, an avenue is named after her, Blvd. Dolores del Río. Since 1983, the society Periodistas Cinematográficos de México (Mexican Film Journalists) (PECIME) has been giving the Diosa de Plata (Dolores del Río) Award for the best dramatic female performance. In 1995, fashion designer John Galliano realized a tribute to del Rio in his Fall /Winter collection Dolores. In 2005, on what was believed to be the centenary of her birth (she was actually born in 1904), her remains were moved to the Rotonda de las Personas Ilustres in Mexico City. Del Rio was the subject for a fashion collection by notable Mexican fashion milliner to the stars Gladys Tamez, paying tribute to her numerous roles in Mexican cinema. On 3 August 2017, the 113th anniversary of her birth, Google released a Google Doodle created by Google artist Sophie Diao honoring Del Río. After her death, actor Vincent Price used to sign his autographs as "Dolores del Río". When asked why, the actor replied: "I promised Dolores on her deathbed that I would not let people forget about her."

Characterizations Chester Gould, the creator of Dick Tracy, took Dolores del Río as inspiration to create Texie Garcia, one of Tracy's main enemies. She appeared in vintage footage in the Woody Allen's film Zelig (1983). She was played by the actress Lucy Cohu in the TV film RKO 281 in 1999. Del Río is one of the Mexican celebrities honored in a cameo in the Disney-Pixar animated movie Coco in 2017. She was played by the actress Elsa Ortiz in the streaming series María Félix: La Doña, produced by TelevisaUnivision.

Filmography

Selected:

Joanna (1925) What Price Glory? (1926) Resurrection (1927) The Loves of Carmen (1927) Ramona (1928) Evangeline (1929) Bird of Paradise (1932) Flying Down to Rio (1933) Wonder Bar (1934) Madame Du Barry (1934) In Caliente (1935) Devil's Playground (1937) Journey Into Fear (1943) Wild Flower (1943) María Candelaria (1943) Las Abandonadas (1944) Bugambilia (1944) La Otra (1946) The Fugitive (1947) The Unloved Woman (1949) Doña Perfecta (1951) El Niño y la niebla (1953) La Cucaracha (1959) Flaming Star (1960) Cheyenne Autumn (1964) More Than a Miracle (1967) The Children of Sanchez (1978)

Selected theatre roles:

Anastacia (1956) Lady Windermere's Fan (1958) The Road to Rome (1959) Ghosts (1962) Dear Liar: A Comedy of Letters (1963) The Lady of the Camellias (1968)