My first memory is Christmas in a sweltering Uruguayan summer in my grandparents house, when I was two or three. Santa comes in! Actual Santa. After giving us gifts, he leaves. My auntie comes back from the toilet, having just missed him. I realised something didn't add up. I've been trying to figure out how the magic happens ever since.
My childhood was made up of…divorced parents, who would fight all the time. Riding bikes, sleepovers with friends, getting lost in the summer towns and making up games to pass the time. Singing songs, always singing songs, learning guitar to sing more songs.
I was always falling in love. I've been a romantic since I can remember. Sometimes requited, sometimes not, writing poetry, and then figuring out my sexuality in a place and time when coming out wasn't the easiest or most obvious thing to do.
From you mother I’ve inherited the delusion of going for what I want, regardless of how unrealistic it is. From my father, his trusting that the world conspires in your favour, and allowing things happen.
The Uruguayan dictatorship (73-83) shaped me politically. Even though I didn't live through it, the fallout and public discourse from that has influenced how I see things very much.
"Whenever you want, you can start acting.” This is best piece of advice I’ve been given, by my high school drama school teacher, two minutes into a scene we were doing. I blame her for introducing me to the world of musicals, and getting me hooked on theatre and the art of telling stories.
I was in all the musicals my high-school would put on, which was the only thing I was willing to put in a lot of time and effort into, and ended up being a blessing for my weird social life.
I came to the UK to do a semester abroad at the University of Leeds as part of my Undergrad programme in Uruguay. When I left I knew I’d be back. A little over a year after that, I was living in London full time.
I first moved to London because my partner at the time was coming over to study a masters here, and I jumped at the chance to come over with them. That relationship crashed and burned incredibly quickly, but I was here, and was just getting started on my theatre goals, so I stayed and the rest is history.
My first year in London was eye-opening, chasing every opportunity available, lots of rejection, lots of learning, meeting new people and making new friends, a full rebirth. I had to learn new skills like how to audition, and what my actual identity was here as a Latin American immigrant. London was a lot more chaotic than I imagined it might be. So many unspoken rules, especially around things you say / don’t say. It actually took me 3 years to fully feel I belonged here, and that this was my place now.
Drama school was tough, and I was never the best in class, but quickly got a job in TIE as a performer and got my 10k hours of experience on stage in front of brutally honest, unforgiving, but immensely rewarding schoolchildren. I still can’t believe I make a living out of being a professional idiot. Every day I get to do what I do is a gift.
The biggest obstacle I’ve had to overcome in the UK is understanding that people don’t actually say what they mean. And the crazy barrier of being an immigrant, having to start a career from scratch over 10 years later than anyone else. It is very hard to explain properly if you don’t have first hand experience of migration.
My biggest breakthrough has been the show JEEZUS! It’ not just the complexity of writing and performing in a full time musical from scratch, but also because of the gorgeous team around it that is ever growing, and the funding and accolades that have come with it. It’s mental to think I’m nominated for a Stage Debut Award for writing a musical, to be honest. The kid who used to perform musicals in high school and watched the Les Mis 10th anniversary DVD in Montevideo Uruguay is very much pinching himself.
I have found a superpower in being bilingual when trying to write, especially poetry and songs. I tend to be able to rhyme things that a first language english speaker would never, and that’s always fun to discover.
I find people who can’t laugh at themselves very hard to deal with. Especially in the arts, what we do is ultimately just so silly, there’s no time to be self-important.
I would tell my younger self…stop caring so much about what other people think of you. Who cares? And the more yourself you can be, the easier for everyone involved.
Over time I’ve learnt the value of being radical with your choices.
What I most love about London is you can hear any language and any accent at any given moment, and that’s always beautiful to me.
The best and worst encounters tend to happen late at night on the tube, when some of those barriers come down and we all have to band together for whatever reason.
The kindest thing someone has done for me was letting me stay on their coach for about two weeks, despite not knowing me very well, when i was going through a tough breakup and needed to get out of my place.
My perfect Sunday in London is a sunny sunday in my garden, maybe some friends come over, but we just lounge about and put the world to rights.
When I think of home I think of…the beaches, the sea, the drums in the streets, my friends having a barbecue. When I miss it get together with my latino friends always makes me feel like at home.
My favourite word in English is Serendipity.
The word I most dislike in English is Tolerance
Guido is nominated in the 'Best Composer, Lyricist or Book Writer' category in the Stage Debut Awards for queer Latinx musical Jeezus! which played at Underbelly Cowgate, Edinburgh and New Diorama Theatre, London.
