Xuxa

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Xuxa born (Maria da Graça Meneghel) on March 27, 1963 in Santa Rosa, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil) is a Brazilian television actress, singer and children's television show host. Her various shows have been broadcast in Portuguese, Spanish, and English languages.

Xuxa is of German, Austrian, Italian and Polish descent and was the first Brazilian to appear on Forbes Magazine's list of richest artists in 1991, taking 37th place with an annual gross income of US$19 million. Xuxa has dated Pelé and the late Ayrton Senna, both regarded as important figures in Brazil. Xuxa's personal life has often been very public and sometimes scandalous. She had a daughter, Sasha, in 1998 whose birth was televised live. Sasha studies at one of Brazil's most expensive schools, the bilingual "Escola Americana do Rio de Janeiro" (EARJ), also known as American School of Rio de Janeiro, with a tuition of about $2,000 a month. Xuxa's maternal habits are often criticized, particularly as she has been very indulgent with Sasha, throwing her lavish parties. One, for instance, involved a rented theme park, which cost around $1,000,000.

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Rise to stardom

While performing at nightclubs, she graced the centerfold of Playboy magazine's Brazilian edition in December 1982, which led to her being cast in the motion picture Amor Estranho Amor (Love Strange Love, IMDB page) in which she plays a prostitute who seduces a 13 year old boy. Some scenes with underage actors in this movie would not be allowed by current Brazilian laws concerning child pornography. Xuxa reportedly bought the rights for this movie in order to prevent its distribution. After becoming famous for dating soccer star Pelé, she started hosting a kids show on Manchete called 'Clube da Criança' (Children Club). The show was popular and she was hired by TV Globo, the largest TV network in Brasil.

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Xou da Xuxa

Xou da Xuxa is probably the most famous children's show in Brasil. In the show, aired every weekday morning, Xuxa presented cartoon and games, did interviews and performed some of her songs. The show created a kid show frenzy in Brazil, and until late 90s most TV networks had at least one kids show in the XOU DA XUXA style. Not only in Brazil, but in most of Latin America, XOU DA XUXA-type shows became popular (show with a beautiful host, usually blonde, who presented cartoons, etc).

The audience of the show was of kids who jumped up and down during the whole show. Kids shook pompons throughout the show, marking of the trademarks of the show. But the biggest trademark was the pink spaceship. Every show Xuxa started getting out of the spaceship and at the end, she would go back to the spaceship (it remains so until today).

Every year she released a new album for kids, the 1988 one 'Xou da Xuxa 3' with her biggest hit 'Ilariê' (who was #1 in the radio in almost every Latin-America country) is her best-selling album selling 3 million copies in Brazil alone.

Xuxa starred in a new movie every year. They were all big office hits, with the Lua de Cristal from 1989 being the most popular one. The theme song for the movie was also a big hit. Her second biggest box office was with Super Xuxa Contra o Baixo Astral, that included her hit song Arco-Íris (Rainbow), a hit across Latin America that was the biggest box office success of the year in Brazil.

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Shows

Xou da Xuxa ended in 1993 due to Xuxa's desire to invest more time in her international career, which included Spanish and English versions of Xou da Xuxa as well as various shows in the U.S. and Europe. During that year, she developed health problems attributed to stress; a typical week consisted of seven hours of taping for a month's worth of shows coupled with flying to Argentina where the Spanish version was taped.

XUXA, the English version of Xou da Xuxa, proved unpopular with U.S. audiences and was cancelled after the first season. The Portuguese and Spanish versions were more than 2 hours in length, while the English version was condensed to 30 minutes. The enthusiasm that the live audiences held was noticeably lacking in the English version.

XUXA PARK was a Spanish gameshow she presented that held good ratings. The theme song of the show, 'Sabor de la Vida' ('Flavor of Life'), was a big hit in Spain, topping the song charts. Her 'Xuxa Park' album also sold well, being certified gold. However, the show was cancelled after TeleCinco decided not to renew the show's contract.

XUXA PARK (Brasil) - The Brazilian Xuxa Park didn't have any relation with the Spanish one. It aired from 1997 to 2000 on Saturday mornings and was a modern version of Xou da Xuxa. It was cancelled after several children were injured in an on-set fire. After the incident Xuxa became depressed and didn't appear in the media for several months.

Xuxa Hits - Intending to target a teenage audience, Xuxa Hits aired just after Xuxa Park on Saturday mornings. The show had musical guests and games and was later moved to Sunday and renamed 'Planeta Xuxa' (Xuxa Planet).

Planeta Xuxa - The show was a big hit and was shown on Sunday afternoons with musical guests. It ran concurrently with Xuxa Park. The most popular segment was 'Intimacy' where Xuxa interviewed a celebrity about their sexual habits. The show went on hiatus after the fire on Xuxa Park; it came back and was later canceled due to Xuxa's desire to work with children once more.

Xuxa no Mundo da Imaginação (Xuxa in the World of Imagination) - Xuxa no Mundo da Imaginação arose from Xuxa's desire to return to produce children's programming. The show premiered in 2002 and aired weekday mornings. It was the lowest-rated Xuxa show, highlighting the Globo morning block's ratings loss to the SBT morning block for the first time in years.

TV Xuxa - Xuxa repackaged 'Mundo da Imaginação' as TV Xuxa in an attempt to boost its ratings. In this show, presented on weekday mornings, she did segments on nature but the main segment was the game `Battle of the Titans'. During the show, she presented cartoons.

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Marlene Matos

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Children's entertainer

Reinvented as a children's entertainer, Xuxa began the Xuxa Só para Baixinhos (Xuxa Just for Kids series, releasing CDs and a videotape with song clips. She also began her first tour since the end of her Xou da Xuxa show, and won two Grammy awards.

In 2001 Xuxa began a new children's show, Xuxa No Mundo da Imaginação (Xuxa at the World of Imagination), a show for preschool children on weekday mornings. The show was initially successful, but following a dispute between Xuxa and her manager, Marlene Matos, ratings for the show began to decline, resulting in the show being pulled from air in 2004. Xuxa, however, being one of the most popular Brazillian TV personalities at the time, was kept on and a new show, TV Xuxa was launched, containing more educational content and cartoons, and less of Xuxa than previous shows.

In her children's shows, she consistently wore tight clothing, showing her belly, legs, and even parts of her buttocks, and in her first LP (also targeted at children), she revealed her breasts on the cover by wearing a translucent shirt.

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Actress

Xuxa is also an actress and, together with comedy group Os Trapalhões, she has the 9 biggest Box Office hits in Brazilian history. In 1989 she starred for the first time in a movie with the comedy group Os Trapalhões in A Princesa Xuxa e Os Trapalhões (Princess Xuxa and The Messed-Up Guys), which was another hit.

The following year, she starred in two movies: Xuxa e os Trapalhões em 'O Mistério de Robin Hood' (Xuxa and The Messed-Up Guys in 'The Mystery of Robin Hood') and Lua de Cristal (Crystal Moon). The second was her biggest box office hit, spawning her hit single 'Lua de Cristal'.

In 1999 Xuxa appeared in Xuxa Requebra (Xuxa in Shake It), a movie that was a critical flop but a big hit with the audience. Targeted at teenagers, the movie was still a hit with the audience and next year, a movie in the same style (no story line, lots of advertisements, lots of popular actors/groups/singers making cameos) was made, called Xuxa Popstar.

Then, in 2001 she did her first children's movie in twelve years, Xuxa e os Duendes. A fantasy movie, it not only had many cameos, but also a story line and no advertisements, a first for Xuxa's movie. The movie was a hit and a sequel was made for the following year.

In 2003 she did another fantasy movie, Xuxa em Abracadabra and in 2004, Xuxa e o Tesouro da Cidade Perdida (Xuxa and the Treasure of the Lost City). As of 2005, Xuxa is about to release her first animated movie.

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International career

In the 90s, Xuxa became very popular in the whole of Latin America, widening her appeal among Spanish-speaking audiences, when she recorded a programme in Argentina, Show de Xuxa, which was also popular when broadcast in Chile, Mexico and other 16 Latin American countries. She also recorded a programme in Spain in 1992, Xuxa Park, which achieved a huge success.

In 1993 Xuxa hosted an English language series in the United States, "Xuxa", but it did not achieve the popularity Xuxa had enjoyed throughout Latin America and Spain. Xuxa did not master the English language, which was her greatest barrier to success. However, the show was sold in many countries throughout the world, among them Japan, Israel, Russia and some Arab countries. Many parents were taken aback by her seemingly open displays of sexuality and lack of modest clothing as well as her practice of putting on bright red lipstick and kissing the cheeks of prepubescent males at the end of each show. Also in 1993, she taped "Xuxa Park" in Spain. The theme song of the show spent 8 weeks on the top of the charts and her CD charted gold. Her international ambitions ended after she taped 22 episodes of her American show in a month. After she was hospitalized for several days due to exhaustion, she decided to give up her international career.

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Brazilian icon

Image:Casa da xuxa santa rosa rs.jpg Xuxa is a Brazilian icon, who was part of the childhood of many young people born in the 1980s and 1990s. She is still popular with children today, who listen to her CD collection 'Só Para Baixinhos'.

Her third album is the best-selling album in Brazilian history, selling almost 4 million copies. The album included the hit Ilarie, which went to Number 1 across Latin America and it was the bestselling single and most-played song on the radio in 1989. Xuxa's biggest singles were during her Xou da Xuxa era, the biggest of them all being Ilariê, but she was also successful with Lua de Cristal; Tindolelê; Brincar de Índio and Arco-Íris. Image:Xuxa santa rosa rs.jpg She had a multiplicity of licensed products since the 80s, from bubble gum to televisions, Shampoos, soap, food, books, clothes, shoes, dolls, toys, video games and board games. Just about anything could be found with her face on it in stores in Brazil and across Latin America.

Her revealing clothes were not a big controversy in Brazil, which has traditionally been more relaxed about nudity than North America or Western Europe, and most of Brazilians didn't see anything wrong with the clothes she wore.

Xuxa is one of the richest Brazilian entertainers. In 1991, she was one of the 40 Best Paid Celebrities in the World according to Forbes. She and Julio Iglesias were the only Latin Americans on the list. Xuxa is one of the richest women in Brazil, with a net worth of more than US$160 million.

In 1998, her daughter was born live on Jornal Nacional, the most important and most watched news shows in Brazil. Nine months before, she had announced live at Globo's Sunday show Domingão do Faustão that her dream would come true and she would have a child. She has an on and off relationship with model and heir Luciano Szafir, father of her daughter.

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Brazilian discography & sales

Image:Xuxa xuxa118.jpg

Total Worldwide Sales: 30 million (Taking into account her albums in Spanish: Xuxa, Xuxa 2, Xuxa 3, Todos sus Éxitos, El Pequeño Mundo, Xuxa Dance, El Mundo es de los Dos, Xuxa Solamente para Bajitos) Since Xou da Xuxa era, she sold 14 million copies.

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Filmography

  • 1982 - Fuscão Preto
  • 1982 - Amor estranho Amor
  • 1983 - O Trapalhão na Arca de Noé
  • 1984 - Os Trapalhoes e o Mágico de Orós
  • 1985 - Os Trapalhões no reino da fantasia
  • 1988 - Super Xuxa contra Baixo-Astral
  • 1989 - A Princesa Xuxa e os Trapalhões
  • 1990 - Xuxa e os Trapalhões e o Mistério de Hobin Hood
  • 1990 - Lua de Cristal
  • 1991 - Gaúcho Negro
  • 1999 - Xuxa Requebra
  • 2000 - Xuxa Pop Star
  • 2001 - Xuxa e os Duendes
  • 2002 - Xuxa e os Duendes 2
  • 2003 - Xuxa em Abracadabra
  • 2004 - Xuxa em O Tesouro da Cidade Perdida
  • 2005- Xuxinha e Guto Contra Os Monstros do Espaço
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External links

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Other meanings

Xuxa is also a song from the arcade and Playstation 2 dancing game, In the Groove.de:Xuxa es:Xuxa pt:Xuxa sv:Xuxa

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