Guillermo "Willy" Toledo Monsalve (born 22 May 1970) is a Spanish actor and producer. Besides his stage career he is also noted as polemicist and for his
political activism
Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fr ...
.
Biography
Guillermo Toledo Monsalve was born in
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...
on 22 May 1970,
to a well-off family, son of a prestigious surgeon pioneer in thoracic surgery.
He studied at the
Colegio Estilo Colegio Estilo is a private secular school in Madrid, Spain. It was founded in 1959 by Spanish writer Josefina Aldecoa, who was the Principal of Colegio Estilo for 52 years. The current Principal of Colegio Estilo is Susana Aldecoa. Colegio Estilo ...
in
El Viso
El Viso is a village located in the province of Córdoba, Spain. According to the 2006 census (INE), the village has a population of 2,849 inhabitants.
It is next to Belalcázar, Hinojosa del Duque, Villaralto
Villaralto is located in the p ...
.
He trained as actor in Spain and the United States.
Together with
Alberto San Juan
Alberto San Juan Guijarro (born 1 November 1968) is a Spanish film, stage and television actor.
Biography
Alberto San Juan was born on 1 November 1968 in Madrid, son to cartoonist and radio announcer Pilar Guijarro Ortiz de Zárate. He spen ...
,
Nathalie Poza
Nathalie Poza Maupain (born 7 March 1972) is a Spanish actress. Her credits include '' Todas las mujeres'', ''Hispania, la leyenda'', ''Football Days'', '' Un lugar en el mundo'' and '' The Weakness of the Bolshevik''.
Early life
She was bor ...
and
Ernesto Alterio
Ernesto Federico Alterio Bacaicoa (born 25 September 1970) is an Argentine-Spanish film, theatre, and television actor.
Early life
Alterio is the son of psychologist Modesta Ángela Bacaicoa Destéfano and actor Héctor Alterio Onorato. His ...
, Toledo founded in 1996 the theatrical group ''Ración de oreja'', which presented the theatrical staging ''Animalario''. ''Ración de oreja'' later merged with Andrés Lima's ''Riesgo'' to create the theatre company , named after ''Ración de orejas debut work.
His
breakout role
A breakthrough role, also known as a breakout role, is a term in the film industry to describe the performance of an actor or actress which contributed significantly to the development of their career and beginning of critical recognition. The si ...
came in 1999 with his performance as 'Richard' in the television series ''
7 Vidas
''7 Vidas'' is a Spanish sitcom which aired on Telecinco from 1999 to 2006. Its title translates as "7 lives" and the symbol of the sitcom is a cat, in reference to the belief that cats have 7 lives (in contrast to English-speaking countries, whe ...
'' from 1999 to 2002.
His performance in the 2002 musical film ''
El otro lado de la cama
''The Other Side of the Bed'' ( es, El otro lado de la cama, links=no) a.k.a. ''The Wrong Side of the Bed'' is a 2002 Spanish musical comedy film directed by Emilio Martínez Lázaro and written by David Serrano, which stars Ernesto Alterio, Pa ...
'' earned him a nomination to the
Goya Award for Best New Actor
The Goya Award for Best New Actor ( es, Premio Goya al mejor actor revelación, links=no) is one of the Goya Awards, Spain's principal national film
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (s ...
, whereas his performance in
Álex de la Iglesia
Alejandro "Álex" de la Iglesia Mendoza (born 4 December 1965) is a Spanish film director, screenwriter, producer and former comic book artist.
De la Iglesia's films combine grotesque and very dark elements such as death and murder: most of his ...
's ''
Crimen ferpecto'' (2004) earned him a nomination to the
Goya Award for Best Actor
The Goya Award for Best Actor (Spanish: ''Premio Goya a la mejor interpretación masculina protagonista'') is one of the Goya Awards, Spain's principal national film awards.
Actors that won or were nominated for this category have had a signific ...
.
After years of an alleged "veto" of the Spanish film and TV industry on granting roles to Toledo, Toledo returned to fiction in the
Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...
's series ''
The Minions of Midas'', premiered in November 2019.
Activism
He was noted for his activism in Spain
against the Iraq War and for his support to the
Sahrawi liberation movement.
Distinguished as deliverer of controversial statements and for the "disrespectful" way of defending them,
he has also voiced himself in favour of the
Cuban regime, against the
Spanish monarchy
, coatofarms = File:Coat_of_Arms_of_Spanish_Monarch.svg
, coatofarms_article = Coat of arms of the King of Spain
, image = Felipe_VI_in_2020_(cropped).jpg
, incumbent = Felipe VI
, incumbentsince = 19 Ju ...
, against
Podemos and against
La Sexta
La Sexta (; "The Sixth"; stylized as laSexta) is a Spanish free-to-air television channel. It is privately owned and was originally founded on 18 March 2001 as Beca TV that began broadcasting on 1 April 2001, that same year. By 21 July 2003, the ...
.
Toledo was arrested for allegedly causing "damage" during the .
He was released and the case against him was closed.
In November 2020, he was acquitted after being tried for
blasphemy
Blasphemy is a speech crime and religious crime usually defined as an utterance that shows contempt, disrespects or insults a deity, an object considered sacred or something considered inviolable. Some religions regard blasphemy as a religiou ...
by the Catholic far-right lobby Abogados Cristianos, after writing a Facebook post "shitting on god and the virgin" as way of criticising the opening of oral proceedings against three women who in 2014 paraded a large vagina in Seville under the banner "The Unsubmissive Pussy".
Filmography
;Film
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Toledo, Willy
1970 births
Living people
Spanish male film actors
Spanish male television actors
Male actors from Madrid
20th-century Spanish male actors
21st-century Spanish male actors
Anti–Iraq War activists
Spanish male stage actors