Pedro Almodovar was born on 24 September 1949 in La Calzad de Calatrava of La Mancha, one of the poorest parts of Spain. He went to a school run by Silesian priests, an experience which distanced him from God at a very early age. Bored by life in the country, he went to Madrid at the age of 16 where, after doing various odd jobs, he became a clerk in the Spanish telephone company. Office work in the daytime, but in the evenings and on holidays, the young country boy became actively engaged in the arts. He directed and acted in small theatrical groups, set up a satirical rock-punk group named Almodovar y McNamara, wrote humorous articles in comic culture magazines, invented the character of Patty Difusa, wrote two books (Fire in the Belly and Patty Difusa and Other Stories), as well as photo romances, porn romances and punk comics of a subversive character. But he mainly turned out many humor-ous films on super-8 film which he showed at special screenings which soon developed into real "happenings".

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