Sunshine Logroño
Encyclopedia
Emmanuel Logroño better known as Sunshine Logroño is a Puerto Rican
actor, radio announcer, television show host, singer, comedy writer, entrepreneur and comedian. Logroño has enjoyed success in Puerto Rican media
for close to three decades.
along with his family when he was nine years old. He was soon recognized as a multifaceted entertainer by his schoolteachers and classmates. His nickname "Sunshine" came from a short stint (1973) as a disc jockey for San Juan
-based WBMJ-AM, Puerto Rico's first rock and roll station (another WBMJ disc jockey at the time, Raymond Broussard, better known as Moonshadow, later became the co-host of El Vacilón de la Mañana
, a very popular Spanish language morning radio talk show in New York City). Sunshine was also heard in 1974 as a part of the new announcing crew at "The New WRAI" 1520, a station created by Bill Thompson and "Radio Man" after the format change from English to Spanish at WBMJ. Besides his short stint as a disc jockey, Logroño served as a voice actor for Puerto Rico's then-active dubbing industry. His was the Spanish-language voice for "Little Joe" one of the Cartwright brothers (played by Michael Landon
) in the U.S. television show Bonanza
.
Logroño obtained a Bachelor
in Arts (English Language Literature) degree ("a degree in unemployment", Logroño claims) from the University of Puerto Rico at Río Piedras and a Master of Arts (Theater) degree from Michigan State University
. After his return to Puerto Rico, Logroño was a member of the Puerto Rican folk group, Moliendo Vidrio
which also starred bandleader Gary Nuñez and later comedic actress Carmen Nydia Velázquez
. Moliendo Vidrio made a few albums during the 1970s. By the late years of that decade, the group disbanded.
Logroño kept himself busy in the late 1970s as a voice talent for radio commercials, as a comedic actor on Puerto Rican television, and as a radio host. He co-hosted a morning radio program with Puerto Rican entrepreneur and musician Silverio Pérez
, and served as part of the comedic team behind Desafiando a los Genios, a popular TV mock quiz show starring, among others, actor, writer and film director Jacobo Morales
and Puerto Rico's premier comedic actor, José Miguel Agrelot
. Two of Logroño's TV characters would surface around this time: Agapito Flores, a rather naive country bumpkin with a speech impairment, and Nicky El Bro, a Nuyorican
hustler. A third character, "Chinito Rivera" (a flasher
that said little and wore a raincoat he was eager to open at the slightest provocation) would eventually evolve into "El Barbarazo del Amor", one of his radio characters.
, a musical group named Los Rayos Gamma
, Puerto Rico's most beloved political satire troupe, which had an extremely short but popular stint in 1968 as the creative vehicle for the late satirical writer and journalist, Eddie López
. Logroño filled in for Pérez on vacation, and when Pérez returned, he was allowed to fill in López's shoes (who was considered irreplaceable by some), with great success. Los Rayos Gamma had a television show on channel 7, where they satirized politicians with their songs to high ratings -and, which would be taken off the air due to their rather direct satirical jabs at the then governor of Puerto Rico, Carlos Romero Barceló
. They went on to make a few albums and would return to the public spotlight in roughly four-year intervals, coinciding with each general election in Puerto Rico.
At his initial stages in "Los Rayos Gamma", Logroño created a character that seemed to lighten up the absurdity and gravity of another character, played by Morales, that was in turn based on a real-life incident. During the 1930s, Dr. Cornelius P. Rhoads, in charge of health services for the Institute of Tropical Medicine in San Juan, wrote a few letters to friends in the United States in which he described his hatred for Puerto Ricans. Whether the letters were in jest or not, he claimed in them to have implanted cancer
cells in local subjects without their consent. One of these letters was intercepted by affiliates to Pedro Albizu Campos
's Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico, and Albizu vehemently denounced Rhoades as an unethical and sadistic doctor who treated his patients as guinea pigs. At their television show, Morales played a descendant of Rhoads, "Dr. Cornelius Rodas"; Logroño played his assistant, Igor
, wearing a fake hunch, doing guttural noises, and inevitably messing up whatever plans Rodas had for his avowed plans to exterminate
Puerto Ricans. Igor reportedly was created when Rodas submitted an unwilling participant to a 23-hour long orgasm
using Frankenstein
-like electrodes. Igor was a big fan of Puerto Rican culture, Van Halen
and pornography
, and walked around with a small doll, "Calerito", resembling him, a comedic device that preceded Mini Me by many years. Due to the physical demands on him while playing the character, Logroño has since played Igor only sporadically. A big fan of the character, who got "Igor" as a nickname when he imitated him in high school for his friends, is Juan Gonzalez, the Major League Baseball
player.
Los Rayos Gamma edited a music album in 1982, from which "Me apesta la vida" (My Life Stinks), a funk
-meets-rap
fusion song penned by Logroño, was a minor radio hit in Puerto Rico. Logroño updated the song in a newer version, found in the 2006 Culebro Mendoza album "Culebro Legal" ,this time set to a hip-hop beat.
and his son Elpidio were born. Eleuterio Quiñones, a die-hard supporter of Puerto Rican statehood whose grasp of public affairs and general culture level would be best compared to those of Archie Bunker
in the U.S., and his son Elpidio -a 38-year old special education patient with the emotional age of a child but with rather stunning reproductive organs
- are still a staple of Puerto Rican radio and television. Logroño also developed his own audio production company, Man-TK Records (Man-TK being a pun
on manteca, the Spanish word for lard. Logroño's work is filled with porcine references throughout his career).
. Sunshine's Cafe was very popular among Puerto Rico
's television viewers and its risqué sense of humor guaranteed four seasons of high ratings and extreme controversy. After the show's first airing all sponsors except one canceled their contracts, and the program spent close to six months without advertising. The program was controversial because it confronted many Puerto Rican stereotypes head-on. It also provided Logroño with a vehicle to bring in many taboo topics in subtext, a technique that he personally credits Bill Cosby
with teaching him when Cosby developed a pilot for a Latino-based series in American television that did not evolve into a series.
In the program, Sunshine played many characters; one particular character portrayed a clever closet homosexual named Vitín Alicea Arévalo
, many of whose phrases became household sayings. Another character portrayed a fake Pentecostal minister, El Hermano Emmanuel (Brother Emmanuel), who had a hunch
(mirroring that of a famous Puerto Rican minister, Yiye Avila
) was constantly angry (as yet another local minister, Jorge Raschke
), frequently schemed to profit from the members of his congregation, and almost always was caught doing so. El Hermano Emmanuel constantly spoke trilling r's (and was often referred to as "Hermano Emmanuerrrrr"), and used a phrase mocking speaking in tongues
: "¡Salamaya!" (derived from "¡Sea la madre!", or "Damned be his mother!") as a punchline, particularly whenever the Hermano met a stunningly attractive woman, or when another character caught him in a profiteering scheme. A famous episode had the Hermano try (unsuccessfully) to cure José Feliciano
from his blindness
(Feliciano's memorable response was: "I can see! I can see! I can see that you're a fake, I still can't see a damn!)
The phrase "Salamaya" is still used in Puerto Rico to refer in jest to devout Pentecostal followers (Hermano Emmanuel constantly had two naive female parishioners follow him everywhere) or a small Pentecostal congregation (particularly those with rudimentary facilities, such as tents). Rapper
René Pérez ("Residente") uses it in the Calle 13
" song "Ojalai" to describe the song's attractive female subject in rapture-like amazement.
Offended by Logroño's portrayal of ministers, Pentecostal leaders in Puerto Rico threatened Logroño's program with boycotts, and Raschke and Milton Picón (the local representative for Morality in Media
) actually confronted him on television talk shows. On a rare bow to public pressure, Logroño discontinued the character ("If I keep on doing it their followers will lynch
me!", he gives as an explanation).
actor Pablo Alarcón, who played a Puerto Rican peasant with a strong Argentine accent) appeared in the film, in which a piglet grows to become ten stories tall and attacks Puerto Rico, Godzilla
-style. Among the cameos and film roles are those played by José Miguel Agrelot
, Nena Rivera, Wilson Torres (later known for another comedic character named Maneco), Guillermo José Torres
, Enrique Cruz, Antonio Pantojas and others (Ruth Fernández
sings the movie's theme, her trademark song "Gracias, Mundo"). Jacobo Morales and Logroño appear as Cornelius Rodas and Igor, respectively; Rodas is responsible for enlarging the pig, as requested by Don Rodriguez, one of Agrelot's many comedic characters. A remasterized version, or director's cut
, which adds Vitín Alicea to the plot and features improved sound effects, was released in DVD format in 1998.
In 1991, Logroño had a chance to star in a Hollywood movie: he acted opposite Martin Short
and Kurt Russell
in Captain Ron
. He appeared in the movie Contact
, alongside Jodie Foster
, as a taxi driver, but actually -thanks to the rather extreme talents of the film's editor, Logroño claims- only his left elbow appears on the screen. He won the audition over Rafael Fuentes much to his dismay.
According to an interview that Logroño gave Vea
one time, one day, he arrived at his office to learn there was an audition for another movie. By his own account, he caught a flight to New York City, made the audition, and flew back to Puerto Rico, arriving just in time to participate at a play in Mayagüez
.
Logroño attempted to show his serious actor side in the late 1990s, participating in various theater plays.
. When Iris later left the show for personal reasons, it was renamed to De Noche con Sunshine (At Night With Sunshine). In a controversial network switch Sunshine switched to WAPA-TV in 1998 and was the host of a show named "Club Sunshine", which was aired until May 2009. During that time in WAPA-TV he was also the vice-president for talent affairs of the television station.
On February 25, 2007, Logroño appeared as an archbishop
in the filming of the video for Calle 13
's "Tango del Pecado", the first featured single of their recent album, "¿Residente o Visitante?". He marries Calle 13
's René Pérez and ex-girlfriend Denise Quiñones
in a surrealistic
wedding where Tego Calderón
and Voltio
are the best men. On March 21, 2007, Logroño released a children's book, "El coquí
que quiso ser sapo" (The coquí who wanted to be a bullfrog
), based on a story he once developed and recorded as part of a children stories' album for the Museo del Niño (Children's Museum) in San Juan. A children's musical play based on the book was produced in Puerto Rico in April 2008.
Puerto Rican people
A Puerto Rican is a person who was born in Puerto Rico.Puerto Ricans born and raised in the continental United States are also sometimes referred to as Puerto Ricans, although they were not born in Puerto Rico...
actor, radio announcer, television show host, singer, comedy writer, entrepreneur and comedian. Logroño has enjoyed success in Puerto Rican media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
for close to three decades.
Early years
Born in New York to a Puerto Rican mother, Logroño moved to Carolina, Puerto RicoCarolina, Puerto Rico
Carolina is a city located in the northern part of Puerto Rico, bordering the Atlantic Ocean; it lies north of Gurabo and Juncos; east of Trujillo Alto and San Juan; and west of Canóvanas and Loíza. Carolina is spread over 12 wards plus Carolina Pueblo...
along with his family when he was nine years old. He was soon recognized as a multifaceted entertainer by his schoolteachers and classmates. His nickname "Sunshine" came from a short stint (1973) as a disc jockey for San Juan
San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...
-based WBMJ-AM, Puerto Rico's first rock and roll station (another WBMJ disc jockey at the time, Raymond Broussard, better known as Moonshadow, later became the co-host of El Vacilón de la Mañana
El Vacilón de la Mañana
El Vacilón de la Mañana is New York City's top Spanish language morning radio show. It is broadcast from La Mega and it is syndicated live to a number of different markets in the US such as Providence, Rhode Island; Miami and Orlando, Florida; Atlanta, Georgia; Hartford, Connecticut; and Puerto...
, a very popular Spanish language morning radio talk show in New York City). Sunshine was also heard in 1974 as a part of the new announcing crew at "The New WRAI" 1520, a station created by Bill Thompson and "Radio Man" after the format change from English to Spanish at WBMJ. Besides his short stint as a disc jockey, Logroño served as a voice actor for Puerto Rico's then-active dubbing industry. His was the Spanish-language voice for "Little Joe" one of the Cartwright brothers (played by Michael Landon
Michael Landon
Michael Landon was an American actor, writer, director, and producer. He is widely known for his roles as Little Joe Cartwright in Bonanza , Charles Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie , and Jonathan Smith in Highway to Heaven...
) in the U.S. television show Bonanza
Bonanza
Bonanza is an American western television series that both ran on and was a production of NBC from September 12, 1959 to January 16, 1973. Lasting 14 seasons and 430 episodes, it ranks as the second longest running western series and still continues to air in syndication. It centers on the...
.
Logroño obtained a Bachelor
Bachelor
A bachelor is a man above the age of majority who has never been married . Unlike his female counterpart, the spinster, a bachelor may have had children...
in Arts (English Language Literature) degree ("a degree in unemployment", Logroño claims) from the University of Puerto Rico at Río Piedras and a Master of Arts (Theater) degree from Michigan State University
Michigan State University
Michigan State University is a public research university in East Lansing, Michigan, USA. Founded in 1855, it was the pioneer land-grant institution and served as a model for future land-grant colleges in the United States under the 1862 Morrill Act.MSU pioneered the studies of packaging,...
. After his return to Puerto Rico, Logroño was a member of the Puerto Rican folk group, Moliendo Vidrio
Moliendo Vidrio
Moliendo Vidrio is a Nueva Trova band from Puerto Rico, founded in 1975.Band members included Gary Núñez, Sunshine Logroño, Rosita Velázquez, Iván Martínez, Pedro Villalón and Carmen Nydia Velázquez, among many others...
which also starred bandleader Gary Nuñez and later comedic actress Carmen Nydia Velázquez
Susa y Epifanio
Epifanio González Villamil is a fictional character , who, along with his on-again, off-again partner, Jesusa Cruz Avilés have appeared in popular radio and television programs in Puerto Rico for close...
. Moliendo Vidrio made a few albums during the 1970s. By the late years of that decade, the group disbanded.
Logroño kept himself busy in the late 1970s as a voice talent for radio commercials, as a comedic actor on Puerto Rican television, and as a radio host. He co-hosted a morning radio program with Puerto Rican entrepreneur and musician Silverio Pérez
Silverio Pérez
Silverio Pérez is a musician, comedian, entrepreneur and broadcasting media host, born in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. He is known for several reasons, among them:* hosting several successful Puerto Rican television shows during his career....
, and served as part of the comedic team behind Desafiando a los Genios, a popular TV mock quiz show starring, among others, actor, writer and film director Jacobo Morales
Jacobo Morales
Jacobo Morales is an auteur, whom many consider to be the most influential film director in Puerto Rico's history.-Life and career:...
and Puerto Rico's premier comedic actor, José Miguel Agrelot
José Miguel Agrelot
Giuseppe Michael Agrelot , better known as José Miguel Agrelot, was a comedian, radio and television host and media icon in Puerto Rico...
. Two of Logroño's TV characters would surface around this time: Agapito Flores, a rather naive country bumpkin with a speech impairment, and Nicky El Bro, a Nuyorican
Nuyorican
Nuyorican is a portmanteau of the terms "New York" and "Puerto Rican" and refers to the members or culture of the Puerto Rican diaspora located in or around New York State especially the New York City metropolitan area, or of their descendants...
hustler. A third character, "Chinito Rivera" (a flasher
Indecent exposure
Indecent exposure is the deliberate exposure in public or in view of the general public by a person of a portion or portions of his or her body, in circumstances where the exposure is contrary to local moral or other standards of appropriate behavior. Indecent exposure laws vary in different...
that said little and wore a raincoat he was eager to open at the slightest provocation) would eventually evolve into "El Barbarazo del Amor", one of his radio characters.
Los Rayos Gamma
Morales and Perez would soon revive, along with actor and radio announcer Horacio OlivoHoracio Olivo
Horacio Olivo is a well known Puerto Rican actor, comedian, TV and radio personality, as well as a classically trained singer.Born in Dorado, Puerto Rico, he got his start in show business in 1949 at long defunct WNEL as a radio soap opera actor....
, a musical group named Los Rayos Gamma
Los Rayos Gamma
Los Rayos Gamma is a Puerto Rican comedy troupe specializing in political satire. The group was founded in the late 1960s and is currently composed of:* Sunshine Logroño - comedian, actor, host, singer, producer...
, Puerto Rico's most beloved political satire troupe, which had an extremely short but popular stint in 1968 as the creative vehicle for the late satirical writer and journalist, Eddie López
Eddie López (journalist)
Manuel Eduardo López Rolón a.k.a. Eddie López was a Puerto Rican journalist.Eddie López was born in Fajardo, Puerto Rico in 1940, the son of Manuel López Canals and Teresa Rolón Perez...
. Logroño filled in for Pérez on vacation, and when Pérez returned, he was allowed to fill in López's shoes (who was considered irreplaceable by some), with great success. Los Rayos Gamma had a television show on channel 7, where they satirized politicians with their songs to high ratings -and, which would be taken off the air due to their rather direct satirical jabs at the then governor of Puerto Rico, Carlos Romero Barceló
Carlos Romero Barceló
Carlos Antonio Romero Barceló is a Puerto Rican politician who served as the fifth Governor of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the second governor to be elected from the New Progressive Party and also Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico from 1993 to 2001, making him one of the more successful...
. They went on to make a few albums and would return to the public spotlight in roughly four-year intervals, coinciding with each general election in Puerto Rico.
At his initial stages in "Los Rayos Gamma", Logroño created a character that seemed to lighten up the absurdity and gravity of another character, played by Morales, that was in turn based on a real-life incident. During the 1930s, Dr. Cornelius P. Rhoads, in charge of health services for the Institute of Tropical Medicine in San Juan, wrote a few letters to friends in the United States in which he described his hatred for Puerto Ricans. Whether the letters were in jest or not, he claimed in them to have implanted cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
cells in local subjects without their consent. One of these letters was intercepted by affiliates to Pedro Albizu Campos
Pedro Albizu Campos
Don Pedro Albizu Campos was a Puerto Rican politician and one of the leading figures in the Puerto Rican independence movement. He was the leader and president of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party from 1930 until his death...
's Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico, and Albizu vehemently denounced Rhoades as an unethical and sadistic doctor who treated his patients as guinea pigs. At their television show, Morales played a descendant of Rhoads, "Dr. Cornelius Rodas"; Logroño played his assistant, Igor
Igor (fictional character)
Igor is the traditional stock character or cliché hunch-backed assistant or butler to many types of villain, such as Count Dracula or a mad scientist, familiar from many horror movies and horror movie parodies, the Frankenstein series and Van Helsing films in particular.-Origins:Dwight Frye's...
, wearing a fake hunch, doing guttural noises, and inevitably messing up whatever plans Rodas had for his avowed plans to exterminate
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
Puerto Ricans. Igor reportedly was created when Rodas submitted an unwilling participant to a 23-hour long orgasm
Orgasm
Orgasm is the peak of the plateau phase of the sexual response cycle, characterized by an intense sensation of pleasure...
using Frankenstein
Frankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...
-like electrodes. Igor was a big fan of Puerto Rican culture, Van Halen
Van Halen
Van Halen is an American hard rock band formed in Pasadena, California, in 1972. The band has enjoyed success since the release of its debut album, Van Halen, . As of 2007 Van Halen has sold 80 million albums worldwide and has had the most #1 hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart...
and pornography
Pornography
Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purposes of sexual arousal and erotic satisfaction.Pornography may use any of a variety of media, ranging from books, magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video,...
, and walked around with a small doll, "Calerito", resembling him, a comedic device that preceded Mini Me by many years. Due to the physical demands on him while playing the character, Logroño has since played Igor only sporadically. A big fan of the character, who got "Igor" as a nickname when he imitated him in high school for his friends, is Juan Gonzalez, the Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...
player.
Los Rayos Gamma edited a music album in 1982, from which "Me apesta la vida" (My Life Stinks), a funk
Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...
-meets-rap
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
fusion song penned by Logroño, was a minor radio hit in Puerto Rico. Logroño updated the song in a newer version, found in the 2006 Culebro Mendoza album "Culebro Legal" ,this time set to a hip-hop beat.
Later years
After Los Rayos Gammas TV show was yanked off the air, Sunshine kept active, doing voice-overs for commercials (at one time half of all radio commercials in Puerto Rico featured Logroño's talents in one way or another) and making appearances at several TV shows and radio programs. At one of these shows the comedic characters of Eleuterio QuiñonesEleuterio Quiñones
Eleuterio Quiñones, voiced by Sunshine Logroño, is a recurring fictional character in Puerto Rican radio and television. It is supposed to depict a die-hard supporter of statehood for Puerto Rico, whose passion for the subject and support of the New Progressive Party of Puerto Rico verges in the...
and his son Elpidio were born. Eleuterio Quiñones, a die-hard supporter of Puerto Rican statehood whose grasp of public affairs and general culture level would be best compared to those of Archie Bunker
Archie Bunker
Archibald "Archie" Bunker is a fictional New Yorker in the 1970s top-rated American television sitcom All in the Family and its spin-off Archie Bunker's Place, played to acclaim by Carroll O'Connor. Bunker is a veteran of World War II, reactionary, bigoted, conservative, blue-collar worker, and...
in the U.S., and his son Elpidio -a 38-year old special education patient with the emotional age of a child but with rather stunning reproductive organs
Sex organ
A sex organ, or primary sexual characteristic, as narrowly defined, is any of the anatomical parts of the body which are involved in sexual reproduction and constitute the reproductive system in a complex organism; flowers are the reproductive organs of flowering plants, cones are the reproductive...
- are still a staple of Puerto Rican radio and television. Logroño also developed his own audio production company, Man-TK Records (Man-TK being a pun
Pun
The pun, also called paronomasia, is a form of word play which suggests two or more meanings, by exploiting multiple meanings of words, or of similar-sounding words, for an intended humorous or rhetorical effect. These ambiguities can arise from the intentional use and abuse of homophonic,...
on manteca, the Spanish word for lard. Logroño's work is filled with porcine references throughout his career).
Sunshine's Café
In 1989 Logroño began hosting a show named Sunshine's Cafe on WAPA-TVWAPA-TV
WAPA-TV is an independent television station located in San Juan, Puerto Rico transmitting over digital channel 27, virtual channel 4. The station is owned by InterMedia Partners and is branded as WAPA Television....
. Sunshine's Cafe was very popular among Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...
's television viewers and its risqué sense of humor guaranteed four seasons of high ratings and extreme controversy. After the show's first airing all sponsors except one canceled their contracts, and the program spent close to six months without advertising. The program was controversial because it confronted many Puerto Rican stereotypes head-on. It also provided Logroño with a vehicle to bring in many taboo topics in subtext, a technique that he personally credits Bill Cosby
Bill Cosby
William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr. is an American comedian, actor, author, television producer, educator, musician and activist. A veteran stand-up performer, he got his start at various clubs, then landed a starring role in the 1960s action show, I Spy. He later starred in his own series, the...
with teaching him when Cosby developed a pilot for a Latino-based series in American television that did not evolve into a series.
In the program, Sunshine played many characters; one particular character portrayed a clever closet homosexual named Vitín Alicea Arévalo
Vitin Alicea
Victor Alicea Arévalo, better known as Vitín Alicea, is a fictional comedic character created and portrayed by Emmanuel Sunshine Logroño. Created in the mid-1980s, Vitín remains a popular radio and television character in Puerto Rico...
, many of whose phrases became household sayings. Another character portrayed a fake Pentecostal minister, El Hermano Emmanuel (Brother Emmanuel), who had a hunch
Hunch
Hunch may refer to:* Hunch , a collective intelligence decision making system* Hunch, an intuitive reckoning* Hunch, a forward bend in one's body, such as that from a crushed vertebra...
(mirroring that of a famous Puerto Rican minister, Yiye Avila
Yiye Avila
Jose Joaquin Avila , better known as Yiye Avila, is one of the most famous and respected evangelists in Latin America and a former [Mr. America].-Early life:...
) was constantly angry (as yet another local minister, Jorge Raschke
Jorge Raschke
Jorge Raschke is a Puerto Rican pentecostal pastor who is well known for his opinions on many subjects as well as for his religious campaigns....
), frequently schemed to profit from the members of his congregation, and almost always was caught doing so. El Hermano Emmanuel constantly spoke trilling r's (and was often referred to as "Hermano Emmanuerrrrr"), and used a phrase mocking speaking in tongues
Glossolalia
Glossolalia or speaking in tongues is the fluid vocalizing of speech-like syllables, often as part of religious practice. The significance of glossolalia has varied with time and place, with some considering it a part of a sacred language...
: "¡Salamaya!" (derived from "¡Sea la madre!", or "Damned be his mother!") as a punchline, particularly whenever the Hermano met a stunningly attractive woman, or when another character caught him in a profiteering scheme. A famous episode had the Hermano try (unsuccessfully) to cure José Feliciano
José Feliciano
José Feliciano is a Puerto Rican singer, virtuoso guitarist and composer known for many international hits including the 1970 holiday single "Feliz Navidad".-Childhood:...
from his blindness
Blindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
(Feliciano's memorable response was: "I can see! I can see! I can see that you're a fake, I still can't see a damn!)
The phrase "Salamaya" is still used in Puerto Rico to refer in jest to devout Pentecostal followers (Hermano Emmanuel constantly had two naive female parishioners follow him everywhere) or a small Pentecostal congregation (particularly those with rudimentary facilities, such as tents). Rapper
Rapping
Rapping refers to "spoken or chanted rhyming lyrics". The art form can be broken down into different components, as in the book How to Rap where it is separated into “content”, “flow” , and “delivery”...
René Pérez ("Residente") uses it in the Calle 13
Calle 13 (band)
Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar , who calls himself Residente and Eduardo José Cabra Martínez , who calls himself Visitante Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar (born February 23, 1978 in Hato Rey, a subsection of San Juan, Puerto Rico), who calls...
" song "Ojalai" to describe the song's attractive female subject in rapture-like amazement.
Offended by Logroño's portrayal of ministers, Pentecostal leaders in Puerto Rico threatened Logroño's program with boycotts, and Raschke and Milton Picón (the local representative for Morality in Media
Morality in Media
Morality in Media, Inc. is an American non-profit organization that was established in New York in 1962. MIM seeks to raise awareness about the harms of pornography and other forms of obscenity on individuals, families and society. MIM also works through constitutional means to curb traffic in...
) actually confronted him on television talk shows. On a rare bow to public pressure, Logroño discontinued the character ("If I keep on doing it their followers will lynch
Lynching
Lynching is an extrajudicial execution carried out by a mob, often by hanging, but also by burning at the stake or shooting, in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate, control, or otherwise manipulate a population of people. It is related to other means of social control that...
me!", he gives as an explanation).
Chona, La Puerca Asesina
In exchange for a cameo in the film "La Guagua Aérea", Logroño somehow persuaded film maker Luis Molina Casanova to direct a satirical action film, "Chona, La Puerca Asesina" ("Chona, The Killer Pig"), released in 1988 and filmed in black and white. Many Puerto Rican artists and media personalities (along with ArgentineArgentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
actor Pablo Alarcón, who played a Puerto Rican peasant with a strong Argentine accent) appeared in the film, in which a piglet grows to become ten stories tall and attacks Puerto Rico, Godzilla
Godzilla
is a daikaijū, a Japanese movie monster, first appearing in Ishirō Honda's 1954 film Godzilla. Since then, Godzilla has gone on to become a worldwide pop culture icon starring in 28 films produced by Toho Co., Ltd. The monster has appeared in numerous other media incarnations including video games,...
-style. Among the cameos and film roles are those played by José Miguel Agrelot
José Miguel Agrelot
Giuseppe Michael Agrelot , better known as José Miguel Agrelot, was a comedian, radio and television host and media icon in Puerto Rico...
, Nena Rivera, Wilson Torres (later known for another comedic character named Maneco), Guillermo José Torres
Guillermo José Torres
Guillermo José Torres is a Puerto Rican television reporter and news anchorman.-External links:*...
, Enrique Cruz, Antonio Pantojas and others (Ruth Fernández
Ruth Fernández
Ruth Fernández, a.k.a. Titi Ruth , is a Puerto Rican singer and former member of the Puerto Rican Senate. According to the "Comisiones Nacionales para la Celebración del Quinto Centenario" is said to be one of three artists whose contributions have helped unite Latin America...
sings the movie's theme, her trademark song "Gracias, Mundo"). Jacobo Morales and Logroño appear as Cornelius Rodas and Igor, respectively; Rodas is responsible for enlarging the pig, as requested by Don Rodriguez, one of Agrelot's many comedic characters. A remasterized version, or director's cut
Director's cut
A director's cut is a specially edited version of a film, and less often TV series, music video, commercials, comic book or video games, that is supposed to represent the director's own approved edit...
, which adds Vitín Alicea to the plot and features improved sound effects, was released in DVD format in 1998.
In 1991, Logroño had a chance to star in a Hollywood movie: he acted opposite Martin Short
Martin Short
Martin Hayter Short, CM is a Canadian actor, comedian, writer, singer and producer. He is best-known for his comedy work, particularly on the TV programs SCTV and Saturday Night Live...
and Kurt Russell
Kurt Russell
Kurt Vogel Russell is an American television and film actor. His first acting roles were as a child in television series, including a lead role in the Western series The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters...
in Captain Ron
Captain Ron
Captain Ron is a 1992 American comedy film directed by Thom Eberhardt, produced by David Permut, and written by John Dwyer for Touchstone Pictures. It stars Kurt Russell as the title character, a sailor with a quirky personality and a checkered past, and Martin Short as a middle-class family man...
. He appeared in the movie Contact
Contact (film)
Contact is a 1997 American science fiction drama film adapted from the Carl Sagan novel of the same name and directed by Robert Zemeckis. Both Sagan and wife Ann Druyan wrote the story outline for the film adaptation of Contact....
, alongside Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
, as a taxi driver, but actually -thanks to the rather extreme talents of the film's editor, Logroño claims- only his left elbow appears on the screen. He won the audition over Rafael Fuentes much to his dismay.
According to an interview that Logroño gave Vea
Vea
Vea is a Puerto Rican gossip magazine that has been published weekly since 1968.As a periodical that reports on the lives and activities of many of the island's entertainment, sports, and political personalities, the magazine is no stranger to controversy...
one time, one day, he arrived at his office to learn there was an audition for another movie. By his own account, he caught a flight to New York City, made the audition, and flew back to Puerto Rico, arriving just in time to participate at a play in Mayagüez
Mayagüez, Puerto Rico
Mayagüez is the eighth-largest municipality of Puerto Rico. Originally founded as "Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria" it is also known as "La Sultana del Oeste" , "Ciudad de las Aguas Puras" , or "Ciudad del Mangó"...
.
Logroño attempted to show his serious actor side in the late 1990s, participating in various theater plays.
Currently
He was the host of a show named De Noche Con Iris y Sunshine (At Night With Iris & Sunshine), co-hosted by Iris ChacónIris Chacón
Iris Chacón is a dancer, singer, and entertainer. She enjoys great popularity in Puerto Rico and in other Latin American countries, as well as such US locales as New York, Miami, and Los Angeles.-Career:Chacon has been known by various nicknames, such as "La Bomba de Puerto Rico" Iris Chacón...
. When Iris later left the show for personal reasons, it was renamed to De Noche con Sunshine (At Night With Sunshine). In a controversial network switch Sunshine switched to WAPA-TV in 1998 and was the host of a show named "Club Sunshine", which was aired until May 2009. During that time in WAPA-TV he was also the vice-president for talent affairs of the television station.
On February 25, 2007, Logroño appeared as an archbishop
Archbishop
An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...
in the filming of the video for Calle 13
Calle 13 (band)
Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar , who calls himself Residente and Eduardo José Cabra Martínez , who calls himself Visitante Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar (born February 23, 1978 in Hato Rey, a subsection of San Juan, Puerto Rico), who calls...
's "Tango del Pecado", the first featured single of their recent album, "¿Residente o Visitante?". He marries Calle 13
Calle 13 (band)
Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar , who calls himself Residente and Eduardo José Cabra Martínez , who calls himself Visitante Calle 13 is a band formed by stepbrothers René Pérez Joglar (born February 23, 1978 in Hato Rey, a subsection of San Juan, Puerto Rico), who calls...
's René Pérez and ex-girlfriend Denise Quiñones
Denise Quiñones
Denise Marie Quiñones August is a Puerto Rican actress and beauty pageant titleholder who was the fourth woman from her country to win the Miss Universe contest...
in a surrealistic
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
wedding where Tego Calderón
Tego Calderón
Tegui Calderón Rosario is a Puerto Rican rapper and actor.-Early life:Calderón was born in Santurce, Puerto Rico, the son of Pilar Rosario Parrilla, a schoolteacher, and Esteban Calderón Ilarraza, a government worker for Puerto Rico's Department of Health. Moving at a young age from his native...
and Voltio
Voltio
Julio Voltio is one of the reggaetón genre's best-known artists.His nickname came to be as the result of an accident. Before joining Karel, he worked as an electrician. One day, he stuck his hand in the wrong place and got shocked...
are the best men. On March 21, 2007, Logroño released a children's book, "El coquí
Coquí
The Common Coquí or Coquí is a frog native to Puerto Rico belonging to the Eleutherodactylus genus of the Leptodactylidae family. The species is named for the loud sound the males make at night. This sound serves two purposes...
que quiso ser sapo" (The coquí who wanted to be a bullfrog
Bullfrog
The American bullfrog , often simply known as the bullfrog in Canada and the United States, is an aquatic frog, a member of the family Ranidae, or “true frogs”, native to much of North America. This is a frog of larger, permanent water bodies, swamps, ponds, and lakes, where it is usually found...
), based on a story he once developed and recorded as part of a children stories' album for the Museo del Niño (Children's Museum) in San Juan. A children's musical play based on the book was produced in Puerto Rico in April 2008.
See also
- List of Famous Puerto Ricans
- List of Puerto Rican songwriters
External links
See also
- Eleuterio QuiñonesEleuterio QuiñonesEleuterio Quiñones, voiced by Sunshine Logroño, is a recurring fictional character in Puerto Rican radio and television. It is supposed to depict a die-hard supporter of statehood for Puerto Rico, whose passion for the subject and support of the New Progressive Party of Puerto Rico verges in the...
- Vitin AliceaVitin AliceaVictor Alicea Arévalo, better known as Vitín Alicea, is a fictional comedic character created and portrayed by Emmanuel Sunshine Logroño. Created in the mid-1980s, Vitín remains a popular radio and television character in Puerto Rico...
- List of famous Puerto Ricans
- René MonclovaRene MonclovaRené Monclova is a Puerto Rican actor. Monclova has been popular both with theater and television audiences. Mainly a comedian, Monclova has also played serious characters, a fact that might escape the minds of many Puerto Ricans, since he has become better known for his role as "Lolo", a...