Little Miss Sunshine Actor Julio Oscar Mechoso Dies At 62
Julio Oscar Mechoso, veteran actor known for his film roles in Little Miss Sunshine and The Legend of Zorro, has died (via Variety). Mechoso passed away on Saturday, November 25 after suffering a heart attack. The Miami Herald was the first to report his death. He was 62 years old.
Mechoso began his acting career in his early 20s, and soon landed gigs on television series like Cane, Seinfeld, Miami Vice, Grey's Anatomy, From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series, Matador, Burn Notice, Miami Medical, Nip/Tuck, Life in Pieces, Madam Secretary, and The Big Bang Theory. He also gained prominence on the big screen, starring as the mechanic in Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris' Little Miss Sunshine (2006), as Enrique Cardoso in director Joe Johnston's Jurassic Park III (2001), and as Frey Felipe in Martin Campbell's The Legend of Zorro (2005).
His longtime friend and frequent collaborator Andy Garcia issued an emotional tribute shortly after he passed. "How can one express the extreme loss of someone so close to you, the extreme emptiness that one feels now and forever. A sudden loss is always unjust, but in the case of Julio Oscar Mechoso, my friend, my soulmate, it is greater than that, as I have lost the truest of friends. Julio is a unique and extraordinary artist. I say is, because his artistry will carry on and will be present in all that will witness it. That will never die," Garcia wrote. "I always wanted Julio with me in any work that I was doing. Because Julio always elevated the film. Working with him was for me an effortless privilege. We got off on each other, we laughed and we cried together. He was an actor's actor. We all knew what he was capable of delivering and it was always quite extraordinary... I will miss you, my brother. You left us an incredible and inspirational body of work."
As noted by The Miami Herald, Mechoso was working on a number of writing projects, most notably a script about his younger years running about the Mutiny Hotel in Miami, at the time of his death.