Manu Fanego: "Being non-binary means having the power to create my own providence."
Manu Fanego is a performer, actor, musician, and artivist. “Just as activism means taking to the streets, so too is putting on works that push the threshold of meaning that wants to be eroded,” says the protagonist of Copi’s Le Frigó.
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Manu Fanego realized that the theater was his place in 2008 during the Theater for Identity (TxI) series. “I made my acting debut with my father,” says the son of actor Daniel Fanego. The Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo were in the front row of the packed María Guerrero Hall at the Cervantes Theater. The play was called “A Proposal of Doubt,” and it recreated the Trial of the Military Juntas.
Theater for Identity is a series with political objectives: a strategy of the Grandmothers that proposes "acting until we find the last of our grandchildren." Daniel Fanego was a key player in this initiative, which also proved crucial to his son's vocational identity. Because that day at Cervantes, although Manu had a brief acting role, remained in his memory as a turning point. That emotion defined a passion, a profession, and a family ethic that continues to live on today.
Today, at 44, he recalls that "living with the smell of the damp theaters on 25 de Mayo, 9 de Julio, and Pergamino streets also made me fond of all of this." Along with these tours, there was also a cradle of art, thanks to his mother Alejandra, an artist and now a landscaper. A great-grandmother who played pianist introduced him to his first love: music. He didn't start acting until he was almost 30, before that, he started his rock band, The Keruza.
Manu and his friends toured festivals all over the world, turning the world into a big stage. They also played on the streets and showcased their stage talent to sell CDs.
Between the keyboards and the accordion, Manu showcased the sequins, the megaphone, and a speech that "came easily to me, I enjoyed it, and it made me connect with the audience." His breakthrough came during a clown class. It was alongside Guillermo Angelelli—a leading figure and founder of El Clú del Claun—that he realized the moment when he said, "Yes, I'm an actor." Soon after, he enrolled at the University of Art (then IUNA) for a degree in Dramatic Arts.
On Corrientes Street and on Netflix
Today, he shines on Corrientes Street as part of Bla Bla & Co. with "Modelo Vivo Muerto." He started with this team in 2010, and until the pandemic hit in 2020, they never had a break. Now they're celebrating their 15th anniversary at the Metropolitan Theater. Manu also shone as Guille, the friend of iconic star Cris Miró, in the series alongside Mina Serrano. In "El amor después del amor," he can be seen as Andrés Gallo, Fito Páez's first manager.
She flows between the underground, the mainstream, television, and platforms, and has more than once made her home at the Mu Trinchera Boutique. There, she played a trans candidate, conjugating the ideas of philosopher Paul B. Preciado. In this space and at various events, she could and can be seen with one of her most vibrant creations: Mika de Frankfurt, an international trans artist who, accordion in hand, sings of her adventures.
“Thanks to portraying female characters on stage, I discovered my own more androgynous, more non-binary feeling,” she says. “I was able to discover my own transvestite, which is Mika.” She's expanding that universe with the announcement of a documentary, an album, and more performances starring her. Meanwhile, she's preparing to play more than 10 roles in the theatrical production Le Frigó, based on texts by artist Raúl Damonte Botana, better known as Copi.
“Copi gives you a shake”
“The first time I read the play, I felt repulsed,” he explains, sitting at the Maricafé bar during the press presentation. “Because Copi shocks you. He horrifies you a little, and that's okay; it means you're on the right track,” says the protagonist, who will perform four performances at the Picadero Theater in Buenos Aires City in September.
The first performance was in the body of Copi in 1983, at the Théâtre Fontaine in Paris. In the production, a trans woman turns 50 and receives a red refrigerator as a gift from her mother. In addition to playing Madame L, Manu embodies more than 10 characters and even a puppet in a production that requires a large, clockwork-like crew. The production will be directed by Tatiana Santana.
“Copi is a great provocateur,” he says. And he explains that in this context, it's necessary. While he acknowledges that Copi's activist method doesn't have the same methods and messages as, for example, Carlos Jáuregui, that doesn't diminish its power. The script encompasses a universe of themes that aren't at all soft; “it addresses mental health, gender identity, drugs, social classes, and homosexuality at that time.” Neither the years nor the distance make what these characters say anachronistic. “Copi is very relevant,” he asserts, and we're talking about a play written in the early 1980s, while homosexuality was only removed from mental illness textbooks in 1990.
The author brings us, through time, a politically incorrect and uncomfortable proposal that this team decided to revive and put into motion. "We need Copi's plays to be performed more often and to be on more billboards. It's an Argentine lyric that needs to be there, fighting from its trenches," Manu said at the press conference, along with the director, producer Raúl Santiago Algán, and Emiliano Damonte, journalist, writer, and Copi's nephew.
“Just as activism means going out into the streets, so too is putting on works that challenge that threshold of meaning that now wants to be truncated,” says the Le Frigó performer. “It's necessary to rethink texts that break with that misconception.” For Manu Fanego, every work, every performance, every interview, and every time he lends his voice, there's a sociopolitical meaning to his art. And there's always a side to it, a manifesto turned into action.
Theater as a tool
Manu is a non-binary person. And for her, that identification is a political stance. “For me, being a non-binary person means the power to create my own destiny ,” she explains to Presentes. In a system where identity oppression is mandated, she defends the legitimate right to “be the only person who defines themselves as the different moments pass.”
If we are all born with an assigned name and gender, Manu was also born with a surname that carries weight in the acting world. Just as he was able to define his identity in a constant flux, he turned his father Daniel's "Fanego" into his own banner and a celebration of the family legacy.
“Theater is our tool to fulfill a function we consider essential: to act so as not to forget, to act to find the truth,” explains the website . While the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo continued their search for their families and justice, theater became a fundamental tool for this. That origin in Fanego remains present in everything they do.
In his artivist journey, he believes that art can "nourish minds with associative possibilities that would otherwise be denied." He speaks with his philosophy, which has one foot in that air of ideas and convictions, and another in the current context "because you also have to eat." Here he recalls the words of his father/colleague Daniel: "An actor lives in streaks," he repeats.
This September 2025, Manu Fanego premieres Le Frigó at the Picadero Theater. It's the first time he's been called upon to start a project from scratch. "It's a first experience, and I'm experiencing it with great excitement and love. Because the team is immensely loving," he shares about this production, where, while he is at the helm, the artistry, direction, and choreography are very much at the forefront of its success.
“I try to express my vision in theater and have it move things, people, feelings, thoughts, and associations,” he says. “I try to create better possibilities so that everyone who sees us can find and search.” In Manu's universe, everything flows. And it flows with the love this artist imbues into everything he does, says, and moves.
The Frigo
PREMIERE: Sunday, September 7 at 4 p.m.
ONLY 4 FUNCTIONS
Picadero Theater (Enrique Santos Discépolo 1857, Buenos Aires City)
Starring: Manu Fanego
Book: Copy
Translation: Guadalupe Marando
General Director: Tatiana Santana
General production: Raúl S. Algán
Original music: Rony Keselman
Choreography: Valeria Narváez
Press: Prensópolis – Alejandra Pia Nicolosi
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