Saralegui, Cristina

▪ 2000

      In 1999 Cristina Saralegui celebrated her 10th anniversary as host and executive producer of the Miami, Fla.-based El Show de Cristina, the leading daytime talk show on Spanish-language television. The program was launched in 1989 with a format similar to that of English-language shows, but there was concern that some of the topics traditionally covered by talk shows might be too risqué for Saralegui's more conservative Latin audience. That concern proved to be unfounded, however, and the show was a huge success, with guests surprisingly willing to discuss personal matters on the air. By 1999 it was seen by an estimated 100 million viewers in some 15 countries, and its popularity led the media to refer to the stylish, platinum-blonde Saralegui as the “Hispanic Oprah Winfrey.”

      Saralegui was born on Jan. 29, 1948, in Havana to a family with a long and successful history in the publishing business. When she was 12 years old, the family's good fortune was reversed by Fidel Castro's revolution, and they left Cuba and moved to the United States, settling in Key Biscayne, Fla. Despite her parents' initial lack of support for her desire to pursue a career outside the home, after high school she enrolled at the University of Miami and studied communications and creative writing. She left during her senior year without graduating but continued an internship she had begun during college at the Spanish-language women's magazine Vanidades, which had once been owned by her family. She eventually became a features editor there before leaving in 1973 to take a job at the Spanish-language version of the popular women's magazine Cosmopolitan. In addition to holding editorial positions at other publications, she became editor in chief of Cosmopolitan en Español in 1979, a position she held for a decade. During her tenure she worked to shift the magazine's focus away from sexual topics and more toward self-improvement.

      In 1989 Univision, the top Spanish-language cable television network in the U.S., pitched the idea to her of doing a talk show, and El Show de Cristina was born. In the next decade Saralegui interviewed a large number of celebrities and also covered topics such as AIDS, domestic violence, incest, and gay marriage; she even went so far as to have a gay wedding performed on her program. She became a strong force in the Spanish-language communications market, adding to her empire a daily radio show, Cristina Opina, heard in 90 countries around the world, and a monthly magazine Cristina la Revista, with a circulation of 150,000. In 1997 she launched an eyewear line, and in 1998 her autobiography, Cristina! My Life as a Blonde, was published in both English and Spanish.

Sandra Langeneckert

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