| Zé Celso | |
| Birth Name: | José Celso Martinez Corrêa |
| Birth Date: | 30 March 1937 |
| Birth Place: | Araraquara, São Paulo, Brazil |
| Death Place: | São Paulo, Brazil |
| Alma Mater: | Law School, University of São Paulo (dropped out) |
| Occupation: | Stage actor, director and playwright |
| Years Active: | 1958–2023 |
| Notable Works: | The Bacchae, Os Sertões, O Rei da Vela, Roda Viva |
| Movement: | Anthropophagism |
José Celso Martinez Corrêa (30 March 1937 – 6 July 2023), known as Zé Celso, was a Brazilian stage actor, director and playwright.[1] He was one of the founders of Teatro Oficina, an innovative and politically active theater company associated with the 1960s Tropicalismo movement.[2]
Zé Celso became notable in the scene with his adaptation of Oswald de Andrade's play O Rei da Vela (The Candle King), in 1967.[3] He also co-wrote with Chico Buarque the 1968 play Roda Viva, which was targeted as pornographic and was censored during the military dictatorship.[4] One of his final plays was Os Sertões, a trilogy adapting the book by Euclides da Cunha.[5]
Zé Celso was in a 40-year relationship with actor Marcelo Drummond. The couple married in June 2023, with a ceremony at Teatro Oficina.[6]
Zé Celso died in São Paulo on 6 July 2023, at the age of 86. He was hospitalized at Hospital das Clínicas, after a fire broke out in his apartment in the Paraíso neighborhood. Zé Celso was 53% burned and was under mechanical ventilation; his husband Marcelo, two visitors, and the couple's dog, who were also in the apartment, did not sustain burns, but were under observation at the hospital.[7]