Estela Medina

Estela Medina (born February 13, 1932) is a Uruguayan theater actress and First Actress of the National Comedy until 2008. She is a resident actress at the Solís Theater. Estela Medina was born and raised in Montevideo. Αs a teenager, she entered the Margarita Xirgu Multidisciplinary School of Dramatic Arts. She graduated and made her debut in 1950. Ηer first works were Romeo and Juliet and a small role in La Patria en Armas by Juan León Bengoa. In 1950, she joined the National Comedy, Uruguay's official cast. Among her most remembered works are: The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov, The Cardinal of Spain by Henry de Montherlant; Fuenteovejuna by Lope de Vega; Ibsen's A Doll's House; La dama boba by Lope de Vega; Valle-Inclán's Voces de gesta (in 1967); Mary Stuart (1968) by Schiller, The prodigious shoemaker (1972) by Federico García Lorca, Phaedra (1973) by Jean Racine,Electra, by Sophocles (1984), Those of Barranco by Gregorio de Laferrère (1993), Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, The Road to Mecca (1999) by Athol Fugard, Three Tall Women by Edward Albee, Mephisto by Ariane Mnouchkine, Tartuffe by Molière, Quartet (1997) by Heiner Müller, The Werner Schwab Presidents, La Dorotea by Lope de Vega, The Murder of Nurse George by Frank Marcus and Ashes (2003) by Harold Pinter. With the one-person show Retablo de Vida y Muerte, she toured. Spain, France, Portugal, the Netherlands, Italy, England, the United States, Honduras, Guatemala, Venezuela, and Colombia in 1977–1978 and she presents it regularly in Latin American Theater Festivals (Colombia, Santiago a Mil, etc.). In 2008, she retired from the Uruguayan National Comedy with Blood Wedding by Federico García Lorca directed by Mariana Percovich, a work with which he had debuted in the company, along with Margarita Xirgu and Chinese Zorrilla. In January 2009, she returned to the Solís Theater with La Amante Inglesa by Marguerite Duras. That same year she premiered the one-man show Rose by Martin Sherman, under the direction of Mario Morgan and was once again acclaimed by critics.