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Roberto Gavaldon was the most prominent director of the so-called Golden Age of Mexican CInema. One of the supreme artists of the melodrama, Gavaldon was a rival to Old Hollywood movies. Gavaldon's movies, like contemporary director Emilio 'Indio' Fernandez, were popular and populist. Because that Gavaldon's cinema has melodramatic plots, extravagant and larger-than-life star performances, feverish and hyperbolic scenarios, and thunderous and over-the-top musical scores. Few directors in the history of world cinema have been so fully and passionately dedicated to melodrama - not just as a movie genre, but as a distinct and legitimate art form in its own right. Besides his cinematographic activities, Gavaladon was fighting for the Mexican workers rights and against foreign investment in the country.

Christer Boustedt was born on 21 March 1939 in Bromma, Stockholm, Stockholms län, Sweden. He was an actor and composer, known for Sven Klangs kvintett (1976), Som natt och dag (1969) and Blushing Charlie (1970). He died on 4 September 1986 in Alfta, Gävleborgs län, Sweden.

Effie Laird was born on 30 July 1888 in Chatfield, Minnesota, USA. She was an actress, known for Strangler of the Swamp (1945), Beneath Western Skies (1944) and The Stu Erwin Show (1950). She was married to Emory Parnell. She died on 4 September 1986 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

Hank Greenberg was born on 1 January 1911 in New York City, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg (1998), The Kid from Cleveland (1949) and Major League Baseball on ABC (1953). He was married to Linda Douglas and Caral Gimbel. He died on 4 September 1986 in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA.

Accomplished pianist and organist Walter Jose Wanderley Mendoca was born on May 12, 1932 in Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil. Walter specialized in lounge and bossa nova music with a very soothing mellow vibe to it. Wanderley was already playing piano by the age of five and at age twelve was attending the Licee of Arts for a year for theory classes. Walter started performing and recording professionally in Recife when he was about eighteen years old. After moving to Sao Paulo in 1958 at age twenty-fix, Wanderley made a name for himself as an active player in such clubs as Oasis, the Claridge, and the Captain's Bar. Walter recorded his first album for the label Odeon in 1959. This album and subsequent albums all sold well in Wanderley's native Brazil. Walter was encouraged by Tony Bennett to move to America in the mid-1960's. Wanderley and his trio recorded six albums on the Verve Record label between 1966 and 1968. Moreover, Walter scored a substantial hit with his recording of the song "Summer Samba," which peaked at #26 on the Billboard pop radio charts in the summer of 1966. Wanderley went on to record a few additional albums and even embarked on occasional concert tours of Mexico as well as often performed live in the San Francisco area. Walter died of cancer at age 54 on September 4, 1986 in San Francisco, California. He was survived by his popular singer wife Isaurinha Garcia and a daughter, Monica.