Know Cristina
Cristina's Biography
Cristina's Biography
Cristina Saralegui Enterprises, INC.
CRISTINA SARALEGUI is the granddaughter of Don Francisco Saralegui, a venerated Cuban magazine publisher who had already established several magazines in his native Cuba before the family was forced to immigrate to Miami, Florida in 1960, when CRISTINA was only 12 years old. CRISTINA attended The University of Miami and began her media career as an intern at the Spanish-language magazine, Vanidades. CRISTINA quickly moved up the ranks and soon became Editor-in-Chief of Cosmopolitan en Español, sister publication to Hearst’s Cosmopolitan. She held that position from 1979 to 1989 when she resigned to become Executive Producer and host of her own TV talk show, the internationally famous “The Cristina Show,” which after 18 years on the air, is still one the highest rated programs on Spanish-language TV.
Under the banner CRISTINA SARALEGUI ENTERPRISES, INC. (CSE), CRISTINA and her husband and manager Marcos Avila have built a media company, which is housed at the sprawling Blue Dolphin Studios. It was inaugurated on May 6, 2001 and consists of state of the art television production facilities with three sound stages available to outside productions. Blue Dolphin Studios also serves as the home of “The Cristina Show” and as the headquarters for all CSE subsidiaries.
CRISTINA’s bilingual web site, www.cristinaonline.com was launched in October 1998 and has become one of the hottest sites on the Internet, providing access to all of the subsidiaries under the CSE umbrella. Visitors can access pages for “The Cristina Show,” “Arriba La Vida / Up With Life Foundation,” information on CRISTINA’s highly acclaimed 1998 autobiography My Life as a Blonde, released simultaneously in English and Spanish by Warner Books, as well as view the Casa Cristina™ Collection.
Cristina, The Activist
Aside from her career as an EMMY® award-winning talk show host and CEO of a media and licensing empire, CRISTINA devotes her time to a myriad of social causes. She and her husband Marcos Avila founded the “Arriba la Vida/Up with Life Foundation” in 1996, a private foundation dedicated to AIDS awareness and education among Hispanics, as well as other AIDS related causes that touch the lives of Hispanics everywhere. The foundation also remains flexible to respond to unique challenges, ideas and projects that fulfill the ideals of service and vision of its founders. Funding for the foundation’s mission is provided by the personal contributions of its founders, and through a broad range of media-related fund raising activities.
In September 2005, CRISTINA received the Valor Award from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) in recognition of her pioneering efforts in educating her viewers on gay and lesbian issues as well as AIDS awareness and education.
CRISTINA is on the Board of Directors of The Museum of Television & Radio and is a member of the National Council of the American Foundation for AIDS Research (AmFar).
Her husband, Marcos Avila, a former musician and founding member of the highly successful musical group, Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine, manages CRISTINA. The couple, who has three children, resides in Miami.