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A persistent and a dreamer, René Fernández Santana (Matanzas, 1944), the leader of the emblematic Teatro Papalote group, created in 1962 as Grupo Guiñol de Matanzas, has been recognized with the most diverse awards, such as the Premio Nacional de Teatro 2007 (2007 National Theater Award,) Maestro de Juventudes and, at the 19th World Congress of the ASSITEJ, held in Cape Town, South Africa, the Inspiring International Dramatists Award, together with Canadian Suzanne Lebeau and British Kevin Dyer.
For more than fifty years, the director, designer, choreographer, pedagogue, actor and promoter has also had a rising career, which since 1964, with the staging of his work La amistad es la paz, places him as one of the most important representatives of theater for children and puppets in Cuba and in Latin America.
Teatro Papalote and René Fernández Santana are one and the same thing, a particular way of conceiving theater for children and puppets that has represented Cuba since 1984 in countries such as Poland, the Dominican Republic, Russia, Chile, Sweden, Mexico, France and, countless times, in Spain.