Raquel Meller(1888-1962)

Raquel Meller was born in Tarazona, Zaragoza, Aragón (Spain) from a very poor family. Since her parents could not afford her education she was sent to live with an aunt who was a nun at a convent. At age 12 she returned with her parents who were then residing in Barcelona and shortly after began working as a seamstress in a shop that catered to many show business personalities. In 1907 she left the shop to start singing "cuplés" ("couplets") using the name "La Bella Raquel". Although these songs were considered indecent and were initially performed in venues attended by men only, Raquel with her beauty and charismatic presence raised the "cuplé" genre to a more respectable art making it acceptable to families. After a love affair with a German named Moeller, Raquel adopted his last name changing it to Meller to make it sound Spanish.

The quality of her voice was a source of debate, but for her fans and theater-goers in general Meller could do no wrong. "Raquel Meller is a genius." exclaimed at one point Sarah Bernhardt. Songs such as "La Violetera", "El Relicario", "Flor de Te", "Mimosa", "Flor del Mal", etc., became standards thanks to her interpretation. She was the first Spanish popular singer to succeed in Europe and the Americas including the United States where her recordings enjoyed great popularity and her live concerts in 1926 broke box-office records in the most important American cities. At the height of her popularity she endorsed several products as well as backing many articles named after her from dolls, to perfume, all of which supplemented her already high income making her one of the wealthiest women in the world.

She was also a hit on the big screen, starring in important films such as_Violettes impériales (1923)_and Carmen (1926). Meller filmed mostly in France but in 1927 she starred in a short sound feature for Movietone Fox in New York in which she sang four of her hits. Charles Chaplin, a big Meller fan, offered her the part of Josephine de Beauharnais in a film he was planning based on life of Napoleon Bonaparte but Raquel could not find time for the project. A few years later Chaplin wanted her for the part of the blind girl in _City Lights (1931)_but Raquel was now involved in a play written especially for her by Maurice Rostand in which she could achieve her dream of becoming a serious stage actress in a respectable Paris theater. Chaplin replaced her with Virginia Cherrill but he kept Raquel's theme "La Violetera" in the film music score taking credit for its composition which resulted in a law suit by the song's composer Jose Padilla.

Raquel continued performing and was a big draw in vaudeville circuits well into the 1940s. Her private life was followed with great interest by the media and the public. She was imperious, ruthless (especially with the competition), lovable, funny, temperamental, generous, witty and totally egomaniac. Her love life was not as turbulent as many believed but among her many admirers there were royalty, heads of state, intellectuals, painters and assorted VIPs. In 1919 she married celebrated Guatemalan journalist diplomat Enrique Gomez Carrillo and adopted a baby girl in Buenos Aires naming her Elena. However after a couple of years of honeymoon bliss came a collision of both temperaments and they divorced in 1922. She had another short lived marriage in 1940 this time to a French businessman named Edmond Sayac and they were together long enough to adopt a baby boy whom they named Jordi Enric.

By then Raquel Meller's career was over, only to surface again in 1957 in the wake of Sara Montiel's box-office success in the films_El último cuplé (1957)_ and_La violetera (1958)_,in which Montiel revived Raquel's greatest hits. As with other rivals in the past, Meller became Montiel's nemesis, but by then a new generation that simply did not know her just plain ignored her. She attempted several comebacks but all were critical and commercial failures. Bitterly, she retired and stayed out of the public eye until her death in Barcelona on July 26, 1962. A plan to film her story starring Sara Montiel (of course) was foiled by Meller's relatives, but some of her story made it to the big screen anyway in Montiel's vehicle L'espionne de Madrid (1962).

Most of Raquel's recordings, considered lost for years, have been trickling out on CDs. However her films remain unedited in home video formats and are seldom shown in silent films revivals or festivals. Raquel Meller has been the subject of many books and articles in Europe. There are streets named after her in France and Spain, while her statue commands a plaza with her name in Barcelona. It is inexcusable that film preservationists and the cinemateques of France, Spain and the United States have shown little or no interest in Meller's filmography. Without these films it is impossible to assess Raquel's personal charisma which was the source of her enormous success and fame.