The name Mauricio Feres Yázbek might not mean much among the general population, but when we talk about it Mauricio GarcesMany will openly quote his phrases as “arrrrroooozzzzz” or “I’ll take them dead” because the silver fox was the one for years Advocate of Seductionfor men and women.
Actor Mauricio Garcés in a promotional photo from 1960. (Credit: Pel Mex via WikiCommons)
Mauricio Garcés (1926 – 1989) was born in Tampico, Tamaulipas to a Lebanese family who fled their homeland following Turkish rule in the last century. The loss of the family business forced her to move to Mexico City, very close to the historic center and the neighborhoods where several Lebanese families had settled. It was also the epicenter of the magazine tents and theaters where stars like Joaquín Pardavé and Agustín Lara, Mexico’s former black-and-white movie stars, made their debut.
Introduced to film sets thanks to his uncle Tufic Yázbek, a portraitist of actors, he decided to venture into the medium under the pseudonym Mauricio Garcés; Adopting a G surname was, according to some of his biographers, a way of paying homage to his idols Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, and Cary Grant, who had that letter in their names. Others say that the choice was not to humiliate his family, although perhaps this unfounded fear would not get him into trouble considering his first roles were second-rate and in films depicting post-revolutionary Mexico in rural contexts.
Clarke Gable in 1938. The famous actor was the inspiration for the creation of Don Juan by Mauricio Garcés. (Photo by The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)
His foray into soap operas, such as his debut in Gutierritos (starring Rafael Baledón and about a man abused by his wife and boss), allowed him to develop his dramatic streak alongside María Félix in La Estrella Vaca ‘ or to further explore the horror production ‘The World of Vampires’.
But the film that made him the alluring heartthrob surrounded by the most beautiful women and spawned the exotic “Playboy” inspired by the Hollywood star Gable, the grey-haired Arturo de Córdova and even the mischievous Antonio Badúwant “Don Juan 67”, which is about Mauricio, a millionaire and incorrigible womanizer who lives only to seduce women of all kinds and conditions. With the complicity of his butler, he manages to win the hearts of many and then leaves them, as he is really afraid of marriage.
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The film’s success allowed the actor to emulate the film’s formula libertine who at some point thinks of correcting the path, as in the classical Spanish literature of the seventeenth century. For example, “Fray Don Juan”, “Single Department” or “Great Body of Crime”, among other films in which actors such as Miroslava, Tere and Lorena Velásquez, Libertad Lamarque, Claudia Islas, Fanny Cano, Rosita Quintana, Elsa Aguirre , and a few more.
But the character (or characters, because they’ve always had someone else) also enlivened phrases that continue in the popular collective — “I’ll take her dead” or “It must be awful to have me and then lose me” — and are repeated on various social networks, especially when trying to send a hint of unrequited romantic interest. The hashtag #mauriciogarces on TikTok has nine million views.
Actor Mauricio Garcés in a promotional photo from 1960. (Credit: Pel Mex via WikiCommons)
The Monterrey group Plastilina Mosh exemplifies the influence of the silver fox in their song “Ode to Mauricio Garcés”. The track is a harmonic progression based on jazz and lounge, plus a guitar solo by Jonáz and pianos by Rosso. In a retrospective in ‘Warp’, Jonáz is quoted as saying that when he was a kid he used to meet up with his cousins to watch TV and the character of the actor “was something very refreshing for me… he said, ‘Dude, that fart is with a mother'”, therefore “when Rosso tells me – the harmonic progression is already there – I tell him – no m*&es, I often remember Mauricio Garcés – and that’s where the idea of the name came from”.
Another sign that fame is surpassing the actor happened before Valentine’s Day last February, when a photo of a young man apparently praying to the actor’s sculpture in Tampico to help him not spend Valentine’s Day alone went viral became.
Despite becoming Mexico’s most prominent seducer, he always remained single. When he was once asked in an interview why he never married, even though he knew so much about women, he replied: “Precisely because I know too much.” Other versions also indicate that the only woman in his life was his mother, with whom he lived for many years; and that the Gallant was said to have had an interest in men, which has never been confirmed.