Doris Welles

Doris María Buonaffina, known as Doris Wells, (Caripito, Monagas, October 28, 1944-Caracas, September 20, 1988) was an actress, writer and Venezuelan film director.

Beginnings

She moved with her family when she finished elementary school, and secretly from her mother, she decided to enroll in a theater school run by Juana Sujo.

A publicist discovered her and asked her to do a live advertisement for the well-known bath soap Lux. From there she did work as a model for RCTV and after several appearances in advertisements she was given the opportunity to make soap operas.

She was chosen to be part of the cast of Historia de tres hermanas, along with figures such as Eva Moreno, Eva Blanco, Raúl Amundaray and Guillermo González; and other later ones such as Renzo the Gypsy, Corazón salvaje and El Mulato. In these participations, she stood out in the antagonistic roles, with which she demonstrated her histrionics on the big screen.

Finally, the RCTV producers decided to give her the chance to star in stories like Regina Carbonell, Woman Sacrifice, Raquel, Champions, The Climber and Poor black man. Later in 1977, José Ignacio Cabrujas called her to play Pilar in La señora de Cárdenas, considered the telenovela that revolutionized the genre due to its current theme, which broke with the pink novel, whose plot takes place after about 10 years of marriage, where her character, Pilar, discovers her husband's infidelity and must decide whether to accept it and continue their union or divorce Alberto (Miguel Ángel Landa); and also participates in Soltera y sin compromiso. Later, by the hand of Julio Cesar Mármol, she stars in La fiera with José Bardina where she played the unforgettable Isabel Blanco, later he participates in La Comadre and Gómez I, where he shares credits with Rafael Briceño, Gustavo Rodríguez, Miguel Ángel Landa and Cecilia Villarreal. Then in 1982 she was in What happened to Jacqueline? alongside Raúl Amundaray and Jean Carlo Simancas

Doris Wells broke paradigms by dabbling in acting, directing, writing, locution and in Venezuelan politics. She was an artist who went beyond, beyond her times. She never wanted to talk about her private life, as she herself said: «My private life belongs to me. Too much has already been said and written about our marriage. I don't want to say who I married. Everyone already knows it." (Variedades, 1966), according to an interview with her three children, Marielva Rísquez, Xavier Rísquez and Verónica Rísquez, at www.el-teatro.com.

Activity as director and producer

Doris Wells announced her definitive retirement from soap operas and made her debut as a writer and producer with the short film for TV Porcelana (1981), in which she played a successful manager who has to deal with the crisis of the 1940s and in the short film The Final Defeat (1982) where she got the leading role playing a guerrilla. At that time, he also participated in the Venezuelan films Ana, passion of two worlds (1982), La casa de Agua (1983) and Oriana (1985) by Fina Torres, this last film won the Camera d'Or award at the Cannes Film Festival, which would consecrate it worldwide.

As for her personal life, Wells had to face the sudden death of her husband, the wealthy Venezuelan lawyer William Rísquez Iribarren, with whom she had three children (Marielba, Xavier and Verónica). In 1986 she returned to television as the presenter of the television program Millionaire Contest ; which in its last season was led by Napoleón Bravo, who replaced it due to the deterioration of its state of health.

Illness and death

Shortly thereafter, Doris Wells began suffering from a disease that attacks the liver called Foil syndrome, or cat-scratch adenitis. She passed away on September 20, 1988, at the age of 43.

Filmography

Soap Operas

TV Theaters and TV Movies

Cinema