Silvio Horta

Silvio Horta may not be a household name, but with his work as showrunner and head writer on the groundbreaking comedy-drama series "Ugly Betty" (ABC, 2006-2010), he was a vital part of the growing representation of Hispanic culture and LBGT portrayals on American television. Born to Cuban immigrants-his father a guitar player and his mother a grocery store employee-Silvio Horta was raised in Miami, Florida. While matriculating at Coral Gables Senior High School (class of 1992), he divided his time between the school's Experimental Theater program and earning extra cash from other students, who paid him $10 a pop to do their creative writing assignments for them. A student of film directing at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, he headed west upon graduation and settled in Los Angeles, hoping to make his name as a writer. While working as a perfume spritzer at Westside Pavilion's Nordstrom, he sold his first screenplay, the cleverly bloody horror story "Urban Legend," which became a 1998 sleeper hit starring Alicia Witt, Jared Leto, Rebecca Gayheart, and Tara Reid, and spawning an equally successful sequel in 2000. While his next project, a show called "The Furies" co-written by "Glee" and "American Horror Story" creator Ryan Murphy, never got beyond pilot season, Horta made his talents known as a showrunner with the genre programs "The Chronicle" (Sci Fi, 2001-02) and "Jake 2.0" (UPN, 2003-04), both one season wonders that were ignored by critics and viewers alike. The following year, ABC and actress-producer Salma Hayek called him up to see if he'd be interested in adapting the Colombian telenovela "Yo Soy Betty, La Fea," a megahit in its native country and the rest of Latin America. Premiering in the fall of 2006, "Ugly Betty" was a brightly colored combination of nighttime soap melodrama and wacky slapstick comedy that followed the adventures of a Queens-born ugly duckling (America Ferrera) working at a fashion magazine; it quickly became the most-watched new show of the season. While some critics derided the show for its jarring tonal shifts and broad caricatures, it won the 2007 Golden Globe Award for Best Comedy and was nominated at the 2007 Primetime Emmy Awards in the same category. "Ugly Betty" ran for four seasons to a dedicated viewership, thanks especially to its tender portrayals of Latino and LGBT characters-Horta had been openly gay since he was 19-earning it and Horta accolades from the ALMA, NAACP Image, and GLAAD Media Awards. Silvio Horta died on January 7, 2020 in Miami, FL at the age of 45.