The Mexican actor and conductor Xavier López Rodríguez, who died this Saturday at the age of 88, will be remembered as his character “Chabelo”, a high-voiced boy in shorts who has been a part of Mexican life since he first played him in the 1950s.
“This is a very sad morning, Xavier López Chabelo, father, brother and husband, has left us suddenly, due to abdominal complications,” the actor’s relatives reported.
In addition, the López Miranda family asked Mexicans and followers of the iconic character Chabelo to pray for his rest, as well as allow them to mourn his departure in peace.
“With a torn soul and knowing that many and many people have loved him for many years and that they will feel his departure, we ask you to pray for his rest and give us the opportunity to peacefully mourn the grief that overwhelms our entire family,” they said.
Although Chabelo grew up and lived most of his life in Mexico, was born on February 17, 1935 in Chicago, United Stateswhere his parents met and lived.
In fact, he always retained American citizenship and was even recruited at the age of 18 by the Army of that country during the Korean War (1950-1953).
He served for a few months at a military base in San Diego, although he never saw combat action because the conflict ended in those days.
After returning to Mexico from his draft, He entered the university to study medicine, but by chance and necessity he started working as a general assistant in the incipient Mexican television.
On one occasion the announcer and presenter Ramiro Gamboa, “Tío Gamboín”, knowing his ability to imitate voices, asked him to read a joke from a book.
It was about a father and his son, whose name was Chabelo, and when reading it he made the voice of a child that would accompany him from now ondespite his imposing 1.92 meters in height.
Gamboa invited him to tell jokes by his side on the radio and thus Chabelo was born during the broadcast of the children’s program Carrusel musical.
With the character, López’s career in show business also began, which led him to abandon his medical studies.
For several years, Gamboa and López formed a duo in which the former was the father of the latter in television and film productions.
After living for a time in New York, where he worked in theater and cinema, he returned to Mexico and worked as a writer with the program “La media hora de Chabelo”, which lasted more than seven years and from which other comedy programs were derived.
He worked in numerous film productions alongside renowned directors such as Ismael Rodríguez and Arturo Ripstein, as well as comedians such as Germán Valdés “Tin Tán”, Manuel “Loco” Valdés, Gaspar Henaine “Capulina” and Mario Moreno “Cantinflas”. .
In November 1967, his Sunday game show “En familia con Chabelo” went on the air.of a family nature, in which he worked as a writer, producer and conductor.
In 2012, he was awarded two Guinness Record certificates for his 44 years as the host of “En familia con Chabelo” and for his work as an actor for 57 years playing the character “Chabelo, the friend of all children”.
However, on November 27, 2015, he announced the end of “En Familia”, after 48 years of continuous broadcasts on the Televisa network.
“Everything in life has a cycle, a beginning and an end,” Chabelo said in a video released on social media after weeks of rumors about the fate of his program.
But he continued working as the same boy in shorts until December of that year on the television program “Parodiando”, despite his wrinkled face and his high-pitched infant’s voice marked by a harsh tone.
In 2018, many people heard his natural voice for the first time in the thriller film “The Mongolian Conspiracy”.“, in which he played the role of a military man.
A year later, in 2019, he denied rumors about alleged health problems through the networks: “I am very well. Those who gossip, very bad. With all my love I send you a trumpet, ”she said in October, with his characteristic good humor.
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