Los Rayos Gamma - History

History

Los Rayos Gamma began in the late 1960s as a project from journalist and writer Eddie López. After finding out he suffered from cancer, he thought of a political parody where he could lampoon the current events of Puerto Rican politics, blaming all their wrongdoings and the parody itself on gamma rays (a pun on his current therapy against his illness).

He then contacted friends Horacio Olivo, Silverio Pérez and Jacobo Morales to help him with the project. Morales had the idea of taking Eddie's written parodies and blending them with previously censored TV scripts to produce a political parody stage show. The initial title of the project was El Efecto de los Rayos Gamma sobre Eddie López (The effect of gamma rays on Eddie López) which was a take on the title of Paul Zindel's play The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds. The title was then shortened simply to Los Rayos Gamma.

The show enjoyed great success from 1968 to 1971. That year, López died from his illness and comedian Efraín López Neris was hired to replace him. However, at every show an empty chair would be left on stage as a tribute to López. Shortly after, López Neris was also replaced with comedian Sunshine Logroño.

After that, the group decided to take an indefinite break. In the late 1970s, however, Pérez contacted his friends to regroup. Enjoying the same level of success, they even had several programs on Puerto Rican television.

The group has continued their shows around the island, while each member also pursues his individual endeavors. They roughly reconvene every two years, usually previous to an election year.