254
classic broadcasts of La Tremenda Corte (in Spanish)
6 classic broadcasts of Latin
America Popular Music Series
ALL KNOWN EPISODES TO EXIST.
Don't be fooled by other
collections that claim to contain more episodes. Many of these shows
were aired on multiple dates in reruns, so you have plenty of
sellers out there padding their collections with reruns!
We feature all known episodes in existence and do not add
"fluff" to our collections to increase our claimed episode count
like many others.
NOTICE: This
collection is all in MP3 format supplied on DVD. You play
this in your computer and then can copy all the MP3 files to
your MP3 player of choice. This DVD will NOT play in a
regular CD player in your car, or your TV's DVD player, it is
intended for your computer only which will allow you to transfer
the MP3 files to any device that can play MP3's. This collection remains the
largest most original collection on ebay.
Le
Tremenda Corte:
La Tremenda Corte
(Spanish for "The Awesome Courthouse") was a radio
comedy show produced in Havana, Cuba. The scripts were
written by Cástor Vispo, a Spaniard who became Cuban
citizen. The show was aired nonstop from 1942 to 1961.
Later, the format of the show was adapted for a TV
sitcom in Monterrey, Mexico, however, only three and a
half seasons were produced from 1966 to 1969.
Cástor Vispo was born in La Coruña, Spain. He left his
hometown at the age of 18, shortly after the Spanish
Civil War broke out, to join his family in Cuba. While
working at the El Universal newspaper, Vispo used his
free time to write. His stories were closely related to
the Cuban culture of the period, encompassing written
press, theater and Cuban radio.
“La Tremenda Corte”, was the work of this clever and
prolific comedy writer Castor Vispo definitely fused
with speech and Cuban folk psychology. Both Vispo as the
production team were given the task of finding local
comedians who would shed an humorous light, in 1941
(during WWII) and help people to forget the hardships of
that time. Soon they found Leopoldo Fernández (Tres
Patines), a talented comedian who was already recognized
in radio spots and theatre, and his inseparable friend,
Anibal de Mar. The duo had already achieved popularity
as the comedy duo Pototo y Filomeno, and they would
bring parts of their act into the new show. The rest of
the cast came from tests with other less well-known
comedians, but equally outstanding.
The program began broadcasting on radio station
RHC-Cadena Azul on January 7, 1942. It was owned by
Amado Trinidad Velasco since 1941 (RHC belonged to the
famous cigarette company Trinidad and Brothers).
In 1947, “La Tremenda Corte” like several other programs
of its time, was transferred to rival station CMQ Radio
advertisers and sponsors, seeking greater competitive
advantage. The programs were broadcast live back then,
three times per week from Monday to Friday at 8:30 pm
and were sponsored by a firm of perfumery and soaps.
La Tremenda Corte aired uninterrupted from 1942 to 1961
(first RHC Cadena Azul and later at QMC), and its sole
writer was Vispo. Despite such strenuous work for his
imagination, Vispo always managed to pull through during
this period. Over 360 shows are estimated to have been
recorded, many of which are still heard on radio, but a
few such episodes have never left Cuba and little is
therefore known about them. Of all these missing radio
shows were recorded at station CMQ in Havana, between
1947 and 1961, no one knows how many still survive, and
they are considered rare and invaluable for fans and
collectors of the series. In the peak of their success,
the performances of the cast were taken to countries
such as Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Colombia, Peru, Panama
and the Dominican Republic, where they were acclaimed.
Beginning in 1960, production took a drastic turn for
the show as a result of the revolution headed by Fidel
Castro.
The show had been adapted previously to play in local
theatres to some controversy, since the actors (Leopoldo
Fernández especially) were vocal political critics both
off and on stage.
Castro's regime, with its rigid Marxist tendency in
those years, showed its displeasure with the existence
of comedy shows on the broadcast media, especially when
political leaders started to become the butt of jokes.
1960 and 1961 were particularly difficult for the cast,
as the government began sending sympathizers to chant
Communist slogans and disrupt the performances by any
means necessary.
Then in 1961 a decree was issued in the island placing
all theater, radio and TV troupes under the purview of
the state's Censorship Commission.
Fernández was arrested over a shooting in a performance
and had to serve a 27-day house arrest sentence for
which no further explanation was offered.
After his release, Fernández is said to have made a
short comic piece where he played “Pototo” while he and
another actor reviewed a file of Cuban presidents'
photos to install them on the wall. The other player
showed a photo of Fulgencio Batista and Fernández said
to him: “Throw this one away.” The other actor continued
showing different pictures to Pototo's unchanging reply:
– “Throw this one away too…” Finally, the assistant
grabbed a photo of Fidel Castro. Leopoldo watched it,
showed it to the audience and went to the wall as he
said with his characteristic ironic humor: – “Allow me —
I want to hang this one myself…”.
The joke, which spread far and wide and was repeated
everywhere, was said to end with an assertion that this
line had caused his detention — and would cause his
later self-exile from Cuba in the same year. However,
this story was later denied in Miami by Fernández, who,
on hearing it from an alleged theater hand present at
that performance, corrected the storyteller with visible
displeasure and said: "Gentlemen, had I done and said
those things, I would not be here to tell you the story…
".
Whatever the case, Cuban authorities finally shut down
both the stage version of La Tremenda Corte and Pototo y
Filomeno in Cuba, and in early 1962, the Cuban
government seized CMQ and cancelled all comedy shows
that were on air.
This caused the main cast of “La Tremenda Corte” (with
the exception of the production team, Cástor Vispo
included) to leave Cuba that year for Miami, never to
return.
The self-exile was driven by economic reasons, never by
ideological differences. In fact, none of the cast team
expressed in that moment any political affinity and they
decided to stay besides the facts that were addressing
the Cuban society, even if they were living in a foreign
country.
In those times actors did not receive income from the
copy rights of the program, as it happens today, for
this reason Abel Mestre, (who had been executive of
company CMQ before being expropriated by the castrismo)
bought many of the chapters from La Tremenda Corte for a
truly derisory sum. Later he offered them for sale to
many of the main Latin American radio stations of those
years. The sale value was estimated in those years in
$20 U.S. by episode, or more than $7.000 U.S. the
totality of the episodes which still engravings are
conserved, and are worth an exorbitant amount nowadays.
