Ricardo Chavira: I loved doing Desperate Housewives but I'll never wear that goatee again ... unless someone pays me a lot
Desperate Housewives star Ricardo Chavira may have had huge success with the long-running TV show — but he says it was nothing compared to making his UK stage debut.
And even though he spent eight years playing Carlos Solis, husband of Eva Longoria’s Gabrielle, in the series, he is walking the streets of London unhassled because no one recognises him without that role’s trademark goatee beard. Speaking after the opening night of The Motherf**ker with the Hat at the National Theatre, Chavira, 43, said: “For me this is more successful than anything because this has pushed me and challenged me as an actor, as a human being, as a piece of an ensemble.”
The Texan-born star, who was last on stage four years ago in A Streetcar Named Desire, said: “Housewives was a wonderful opportunity and a great show but it wasn’t Tennessee Williams, it’s not Stephen Adly Guirgis.”
He was called to audition just after a friend had told him he would be ideal for the role of Jackie. “The last time someone told me that, I got Housewives. And when I got the job I knew it was something special because the date of the opening night was my mother’s birthday.” She died when Chavira was 15.
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“This is my first time ever in London,” he said. “I get the occasional ‘whoah, I recognise him, I think I recognise him’ but by that point I have walked right past. It’s that goatee — which I will never grow again unless somebody’s paying me a lot.”
He intends to become the complete tourist when his wife, Marcea, and children, Tomas, 12, and Belen, six, arrive next month. “I want my kids to experience the international influence that exists in London. I am enjoying it very much. I would come back and work here again any time.”
