Maria A. Pons, 82, Mexican Film Star
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Maria Antonieta Pons, who helped define the 1940s tropical-dancer Mexican film genre know as “rumbera” films, died Friday at age 82 in Mexico City.
Pons was one of a half-dozen stars whose extravagant costumes and dance numbers earned them the nickname “Tropical Queens” and created a style that lasted into the 1950s. Her contemporaries included “rumbera” stars like Ninon Sevilla, Mary Esquivel, Amalia Aguilar, and Rosa Carmina.
The genre was pegged on heartbreak stories about seductive, fallen women, punctuated by wild musical and dance scenes in the nightclubs they haunted.
Pons, who was born June 11, 1922, in Havana, Cuba, made about 30 films, including “Noche de Ronda” (1942) and “Mujer del Puerto” (1949).
