The comedian Manolo Vieira has died this Wednesday nightjust a few hours after the council of Gran Canaria let me know what it would be one of the protagonists of its Act of Honors and Distinctions this year. The honor of Favorite Son of Gran Canaria came to Manolo Vieira late, like the writer Alexis Ravelo or the painter Jane Millares.
With Manolo Vieira (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1949) one of the most beloved artists inside and outside of Canary Islands. Last year’s end she accompanied us again with his show, as he had done in recent decades from Televisión Canaria. For 22 consecutive years, he sneaked into our homes through the television to liven up the party and the Canary Islands always fell at his feet. Also on December 31. Manolo Vieira’s New Year’s Eve special was a classic and there will be no more. He had announced that it would be the last, but there was always the hope that it would be a see you later and not a goodbye forever..
Finally, at 73 years old, Manolo climbed the tree, like the mother of the friend of the character in his joke. Everyone who ever heard him tell it knows what this is about. For the rest, we gut it. That climbing the tree was a friend’s way of telling the other “softly” that his mother had died.
farewell
With his hoarse voice and his Canarian accent that he walked around the Peninsula causing laughter, the comedian announced last November that he was leaving the stage with one last show, which he called ‘La última y vamos’. He premiered it with overwhelming success on November 18 at the Teatro Pub Chistera, his usual home, visited by hundreds of thousands of canaries during his 42-year career. During the presentation of the show, with emotions on the surface, he confessed a wish that today becomes an epitaph: “That they remember me as good people”.
“I’m leaving happier than hell”He also said that day. Today all his words sound like a farewell, because that was what he was doing, because he knew he was sick. Less than a week ago, last Friday, he had to suspend a performance of his show ‘La última y nos vamos’, which he had scheduled at the Tías wrestling ground, in Lanzarote. It was said at that time that it was for health reasons and that he had had to be treated urgently in Gran Canaria. Finally, he could not recover from the illness that afflicted him and five days later he died. He almost died with his boots on, on stage. A whole farewell that surely would have turned into a joke and that he would have liked to tell.