Hristos Tsaganeas

Biography

Christos Tsaganeas was born in Braila, Romania on July 2, 1906. He came from a wealthy Greek and aristocratic family and from a young age he showed great love for the theater. His parents, however, had demanded that he finish some university school, and that's why when he graduated from the Greek high school in Romania, they sent him to Athens for academic studies. He initially enrolled in Medicine but soon dropped out and went to Law from which he never got a degree. The reason for this event was his acquaintance and love for the actress Nitsa Vitsori, seven years older than him, for whose sake he abandoned his studies and began to appear in the theater.

When Nitsa divorced her first husband, Giorgis Vitsoris, Tsaganeas not only married her but also enrolled in the Drama School of the National Theater to get a proper foundation and an acting degree.

For this career choice, he had several fights with his parents, with whom he finally broke up and cut off his funding. Another version cites his participation in the political movement of the Archio-Marxists, in which his wife Nitsa also participated, as the reason for the elimination. This development led him, for some time, to live on a boat in the port of Piraeus while he was forced to take part in performances of itinerant troupes, which at that time were underestimated. "There are few theaters, few theater squares, many practitioners", as he used to say.

During the German-Italian occupation he actively participated in the National Resistance through the ranks of the EAM together with his wife Nitsa. During the December 1944, his name was involved in the execution of the actress Eleni Papadakis by OPLA. As a member of the board of the National Militia of the EAM Theater, he had put his signature - together with his colleagues, Emilio Veakis, Theodoros Moridis, Spyros Patrikios and Panos Karavousiano - for the death sentence of Eleni Papadakis, who had been accused of dowry.

A year later, Christos Tsaganeas was in danger of losing his life in the armed attack against the then president of SEH, Spyros Patrikios.