Alfredo Ripstein (Alfredo Ripstein Aronovich) (December 10, 1916,
Parral, Chihuahua
Hidalgo del Parral is a city and seat of the municipality of Hidalgo del Parral in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. It is located in the southern part of the state, from the state capital, the city of Chihuahua, Chihuahua. As of 2015, the city ...
, Mexico — January 20, 2007,
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...
) was a Mexican film producer of European-Jewish descent. He is credited with helping shape Mexico's film industry in the period surrounding World War II.
Ripstein also helped start the careers of several contemporary Mexican actors such as
Gael García Bernal and
Salma Hayek
Salma Hayek Pinault ( , ; born Salma Valgarma Hayek Jiménez; September 2, 1966) is a Mexican and American actress and film producer. She began her career in Mexico with starring roles in the telenovela ''Teresa'' (1989–1991) as well as the ...
.
Biography
Early life
Ripstein's father was a
Polish Jew merchant in Parral. Members of
Pancho Villa's army were the main customers of his parents' store. Ripstein's mother asked Villa for permission to close the store in order to give birth to Alfredo. Villa stopped by the store a few days later to see the newborn. "So the first man that ever carried my father was Pancho Villa", Ripstein's son Arturo told ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'' reporter Reed Johnson.
Ripstein's family moved to Mexico City when he was 5 years old. Ripstein first worked as an
accountant
An accountant is a practitioner of accounting or accountancy.
Accountants who have demonstrated competency through their professional associations' certification exams are certified to use titles such as Chartered Accountant, Chartered Certifi ...
and then was hired by Simon Wishnack's
Filmex company as a production manager and executive producer.
Career
Ripstein opened his own company, Alameda Films,
Alfredo Ripstein, productor de cine".
El Pais
EL, El or el may refer to:
Religion
* El (deity), a Semitic word for "God"
People
* EL (rapper) (born 1983), stage name of Elorm Adablah, a Ghanaian rapper and sound engineer
* El DeBarge, music artist
* El Franco Lee (1949–2016), American po ...
January 27, 2007 in 1948. One of his final feature films was ''El Crimen del Padre Amaro
''The Crime of Padre Amaro'' ( es, El crimen del padre Amaro, known by its literal translation ''The Crime of Father Amaro'' in Australia) is a 2002 Mexican-Spanish film directed by Carlos Carrera. It is very loosely based on the novel ''O Crim ...
'' in 2002
File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...
. It was produced with his grandson, Daniel Birman. He also produced in 2004 BIRTH OF A PASSION, also with his grandson, Daniel Birman. In 2005 he executive produced THE RED QUEEN: A MAYAN MYSTERY for Discovery Channel
Ripstein had collaborated with his son Arturo Arturo is a Spanish and Italian variant of the name Arthur.
People
*Arturo Álvarez (footballer, born 1985), American-born Salvadoran footballer
* Arturo Álvarez (footballer, born 1959), Mexican footballer
*Arthuro Henrique Bernhardt (b. 1982), Br ...
on several films, including the 1999
File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shootin ...
adaptation of Gabriel García Márquez's novel ''No One Writes to the Colonel
''No One Writes to the Colonel'' ( es, El coronel no tiene quien le escriba, links=no) is a novella written by the Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It also gives its name to a short story collection. García Márquez considered it his ...
'' and '' The Beginning and the End'', adapted from the novel by Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz
Naguib Mahfouz Abdelaziz Ibrahim Ahmed Al-Basha ( arz, نجيب محفوظ عبد العزيز ابراهيم احمد الباشا, ; 11 December 1911 – 30 August 2006) was an Egyptian writer who won the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature. ...
.
He produced more than 120 films.
Death
Ripstein died of respiratory failure at his home in the Polanco district of Mexico City. He was survived by his wife and son, two daughters, seven grandchildren and six great-grandchildren at the time of his death.
References
External links
Johnson, Reed. (2007, January 27). ''Alfredo Ripstein, 90; producer helped to shape Mexico's movie industry''. ''Los Angeles Times''
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ripstein, Alfredo
1916 births
2007 deaths
Deaths from respiratory failure
Mexican film producers
Mexican Jews
Mexican people of Polish-Jewish descent
People from Parral, Chihuahua
Jewish film people