Carlos Pumares, Spanish Radio Critic and Late-Night Icon, Dies at 80

Carlos Pumares, the critic who turned anger into a radio genre

"Yes, good evening, tell me." Silence. "Yes, good evening, tell me?" More silence. "Well, don't say anything then... let's go with music." That ritual, repeated for years in the early hours, defines its inventor better than any filmography: Carlos Pumares, film critic, has died in Madrid at the age of 80. The organization of the Cinemasmusic Awards announced it with "Stardust" playing in the background, the same track that titled his flagship program, Pole de Estrellas.

His death triggered a collective review of three decades of dial time and left an uncomfortable portrait: that of a communicator loved for his bad temper, who argued with callers yet had thousands waiting for his voice deep into the night. His case cannot be understood without a programming grid that is now archaeology.

The grid that no longer exists: from Hermida’s talk show to Pole de Estrellas

Pumares entered radio through morning talk shows. The flagship one started with Santiago Amón, Pumares and Garci, mornings, on Hermida’s program. When Hermida moved to TVE to present the first TV morning show, the panel passed to Miguel Ángel Nieto, with Garci replaced by Martín Ferrand, then director of the network. In 1988, Amón died in a helicopter accident and was replaced by Carandell. In the 88-89 season, García-Juez presented it, with Carandell, Pumares and De la Viuda as daily regulars.

From that Radio Antena 3, people remember a lineup hard to reproduce today: Antonio Herrero in the morning, Luis Balbín and his Hora Cero at night, José María García, García Juez. The network lived off two or three programs that dragged the audience of the rest, and Pole de Estrellas was for years the last carriage of that train: it started when another show ended, which often ran over time. Starting with the audience still warm, and the critic already angry about the delay, is part of the folklore.

Three in the morning, Schwarzenegger and a pig in a puddle

His business card was a mix of erudition and street smarts. He knew classic cinema and boasted about watching action movies at odd hours: "At three in the morning I put on a Schwarzenegger movie and have a blast like a pig in a mud bath," he would say. Those who trinc him note he distanced himself from the image of the critic with thick glasses and affected diction.

He had likes and dislikes he wouldn’t budge on. John Ford’s Centauros del desierto (The Searchers) was sacred: he mentioned it with a reverence audible in his voice, leading many listeners to watch 1950s cinema due to his insistence. And he had a ticking bomb: asking him about Blade Runner. He got furious. No nuances.

The Twin Peaks critique that still circulates

David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me received one of his most remembered tirades, replayed these days as a cult piece. The text circulates with the same irony he used to dismiss what didn’t interest him, explaining much of the character: he could spend an entire night dismantling a movie without losing his smile.

The contrast came when his list of best films was reviewed. Centauros del desierto did not appear in that selection, his declared weakness, surprising those who had listened to him defend it for years. Between the critic and the fan there was a distance he never bothered to hide.

Ceregumil, the script girl and rice pudding

The program had its own liturgy and catchphrases recited by heart by listeners. The 2001 specials, the rice pudding recipe, the script girl, Ceregumil, shouts so no one used the broadcast as a sleep aid. And the mythical FI-BER-GRAN ad, which has sounded again in jest during these hours: some have asked for the clip to be played at the funeral.

From his time on Protagonistas, with Luis del Olmo, people remember the final hour and a colleague who ate up the script without reading it: Tip, described as the Groucho of the team, capable of arriving from La Albufera and staying awake for the whole broadcast while the presenter fell out of his chair. A book by Iván Reguera and Juan José Aparicio, Carlos Pumares, un grito en la noche (A Scream in the Night), collects that period for those wanting to reconstruct it fully.

The final stretch and the vaccine narrative

His last years were marked by absence. He left Onda Cero more than a decade ago and his trace faded, with TV appearances that some viewers received uncomfortably. Some argue he lost his place when nights ceased to be his; others respond the opposite, that the place lost him.

Alongside the farewell circulates a story attributing his final cognitive decline to the elbichito vaccine, supported by a doctor’s testimony and his widow’s intention to request an autopsy. None of these claims have public documentary backing and the story itself was met with requests for sources by readers. It should be separated from the mourning: there is no confirmed cause.

Pumares leaves an extinct grid, a handful of phrases listeners repeat as their own, and a void he would have dismissed with a grumble. There remains an unanswered question no one has addressed these days: what became of his vinyl collection, the one he carried from station to station when there was no internet to look up a song requested by phone.