Escrava Isaura (1976 TV series)

Infobox Television
show_name = Esclava Isaura


caption =
genre = Drama, romance, telenovela
creator = Bernardo Guimarães
developer = Gilberto Braga
starring = Lucélia Santos
Rubens de Falco
theme_music_composer =
country = flagicon|BrazilBrazil
language = Portuguese
num_seasons =
num_episodes = 100
producer = Henrique Daniel
location = Campos, Rio de Janeiro
runtime = 60 min
network = Rede Globo
first_aired = 1976
last_aired = 1977
website =
imdb_id = 0142036
tv_com_id =

"Escrava Isaura" ("The Slave Isaura") is a 1976 Brazilian telenovela produced by Rede Globo. It was based on "A Escrava Isaura", a Brazilian romance novel written by Bernardo Guimarães. Isaura was played by Lucélia Santos while slave owner Leoncio Almeida was portrayed by Rubens de Falco.

The series' emotional story created an incredibly loyal audience all around the world. It was a major hit in South America, the Eastern Bloc, Africa and China. cite news |first=|last=|title=Brazilian telenovela actor Rubens de Falco, star of The Slave Isaura, dies at 76
url=http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/02/22/america/LA-GEN-Brazil-Obit-De-Falco.php |work= Associated Press |publisher=International Herald Tribune|date=2008-02-22 |accessdate=2008-02-24] Escrava Isaura was the first television series allowed to air in China with a foreign actress playing the main character. It was the first soap opera aired in the Soviet Union in 1988-1989 (reduced to the 15 hour-long episodes), where it was shown under the title "Рабыня Изаура" (English: "The Slave Isaura"), and in Poland in 1986. The series, one of the first (and only) foreign-language telenovelas to air in the United Kingdom, airing on Channel 4, and is the only one to have been repeated.

"Escrava Isaura" in Hungary

This series was the first telenovela broadcast in Hungary under the title "Rabszolgasors" (English: "Fate of the slaves"). There is an urban legend which states that viewers were collecting money to free Isaura.

Just a decade later another telenovela named Esmeralda started a similar urban legend about people collecting money for the eye-surgery of the blind main character played by Leticia Calderón.

Isaura was the first telenovela in the communist block. It was picked up by János Horváth, an MTV ("Magyar Televízió", English: "Hungarian Television") executive, who is most notably known for starting the telenovela-mania with Isaura. As he told once in a talk-show in the 90s, he was persuaded by a fellow programing executive for TVE ("Televisión Española", English "Spanish Television") to pick it up by saying: "The advantage of a telenovela is that if a woman starts to descend a stairway in the show and then you leave for a two week vacation, she will reach the bottom of the stairs when you get back."

After the success of the series in Hungary other communist countries aired the show too.

References