José Jiménez Fernández

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Joselito
Born	José Jiménez Fernández February 11, 1947 (1947-02-11) (age 61) Jaén, Spain
Years active	1950s-1960s

For other uses, see José Jiménez (disambiguation).

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José Jiménez Fernández (born 11 February 1947), commonly known as Joselito, was a child star in Spain during the 1950s and 1960s. Joselito was born in Beas de Segura, Jaén, northeast Andalucía, in Spain. Joselito made his film debut at the age of 9 and began making other films, including El pequeño ruiseñor, Saeta del ruiseñor, El ruiseñor de las cumbres, Escucha mi canción, El pequeño coronel, Aventuras de Joselito en América, Los dos golfillos, Bello recuerdo, and El caballo blanco (The White Horse), with Antonio Aguilar. Besides acting, Joselito was a popular juvenile singer with notable voice and songs such as La campanera, Dónde estará mi vida, Gorrioncillo pecho amarillo, En un pueblito español, Clavelitos, Doce cascabeles, Las golondrinas, El Pastor, Granada, and Ave María.

"El Pequeño Ruiseñor" ("The Little Nightingale"), as he was widely known in Spain when he became a widely successful child star, had a very troubled childhood that led to an even more troubled life as an adult. José Jiménez Fernández was born in Beas de Segura (Jaén, Andalucía, Spain), on February 11, 1943, although some sources claim it was in 1947, due to false advertising by the studios that made his movies, and which wanted to make him appear younger than he really was (an obsession that haunted him through the whole of his career), pretending he was 9 at the moment of his debut, when he actually was 13.

Discovered as a singer by Luis Mariano, who got him to perform in France, Joselito was introduced to the movie business in 1956 by Antonio del Amo, who directed him in his first feature, El pequeño ruiseñor (1956) (The Little Nightingale), where he earned his famous nickname. Spanish film studios were looking for a new child star to follow the steps of Pablito Calvo, who made popular and populist folkloric movies, which were big box-office hits in Spain during Franco's dictatorship.

After several movies and records, and already a big star as a singer and an actor in Europe, the next move was trying to triumph in America, so Joselito went to Mexico where he filmed various projects, starting by Aventuras de Joselito y Pulgarcito (1960), which paired him with Mexican child star Cesáreo Quezadas Pulgarcito to grant local box-office. His success even reached the USA, where he appeared to great acclaim in Toast of the Town (1948) with Ed Sullivan. However, life was not too glamorous for Joselito, as he was treated almost as a sideshow act by his managers, not allowing him to become the teenager he was (that was a milestone in Spanish "child prodigies" under Franco: trying to keep them as little kids for as long as possible), and even locking him in his room between rehearsals so he couldn't meet girls. He was forced to keep his childlike image up to 1969 (when he was in his mid-twenties), when he appeared in his last film, Prisionero en la ciudad (1969). But, as his voice had long broken, he was not successful anymore and he retired, disappearing from public life until it was discovered much later that he had become a heroin addict and even worked as a mercenary in Africa.

After working for some time as an impresario for the media, Angola's police arrested him in 1990 for traffic of drugs and weapons. An attempt of a comeback as an adult proved unsuccessful, as the tastes of the audience had changed, and his voice didn't resemble the one he had as a kid, so Joselito definitely retired from show business to his home in Utiel (Valencia, Spain), where he, now clean and sober, lives a quiet life far from movies and recording studios.

In 2008 he attended the Spanish version of Celebrity Survivor.