Yuca biography, Enrique Espejo: JB's eternal comedian

Jorge Benavides announced it with a short sentence on social media: “Our dear Yuquita ceased to exist today”. Yuca, the comedian who spent more than three decades taking the final blow in JB's sketches, died on September 11, 2026 at the age of 75. He had been off television for a year and a half, since a fall in Lince left him with a skull fracture. Here you will find his biography with verified facts: what he died of, what happened to him, how he came to comedy from a bank and why so many people confuse him with Felpudini.

Who is Yuca?

Yuca was the stage name of Enrique Eduardo Espejo Peña, a Peruvian actor and comedian born on April 22, 1951 in Barranca. He became known on Risas y Salsa and worked more than thirty years with Jorge Benavides. He died on September 11, 2026 in Lima, aged 75.

Yuca's personal details

Yuca's death

Enrique Espejo died on September 11, 2026 in Lima, at the age of 75. The news was given by Jorge Benavides on his social media. As of the publication of this biography no official medical cause has been released for his death, and at Famosix we prefer not to speculate.

What is documented is the decline he went through during the last year and a half. On March 14, 2025 he was found disoriented in the district of Lince after a fall. He had a skull fracture: he was operated on, went through an induced coma and was in intensive care. In May 2025 he regained consciousness and left the ICU, but he never fully recovered and was left bedridden.

In December 2025, Jorge Benavides said his condition was very delicate. That is the honest answer to the “what's wrong with Yuca from JB” questions that were repeated for months: he was never well again after that fall.

The farewell among his colleagues was huge. Besides Benavides, messages came from Mariella Zanetti, Mónica Cabrejos, Claudia Serpa, Germán Loero and Carlos Vílchez, who recalled 33 years of friendship. Monique Pardo, with whom he had starred in photo novels in the eighties, came to his wake, which the family asked to keep private. It was a hard year for Peruvian comedy, which in March had already said goodbye to Manolo Rojas.

Was Yuca hit by a car?

It is one of the most repeated questions, and the versions are worth separating. On ATV, Magaly Medina said the last thing known about him was that he had been hit by a car. However, what several outlets reported when it happened, in March 2025, was that he was found disoriented in Lince after a fall that caused his skull fracture. At Famosix we record the version documented at the time.

Yuca's childhood and early years

Enrique Eduardo Espejo Peña was born on April 22, 1951 in Barranca, north of Lima. At the age of 15 he moved to the capital to study, and trained in public relations.

His path did not point towards comedy. For nearly ten years he worked at the Banco Hipotecario del Perú, an institution that no longer exists, where he rose to head of savings. It is a fact that puzzles anyone who only remembers him making people laugh: the man who took the blows in JB's sketches had previously been an office bank clerk.

Television came almost by accident. While researching for his university thesis at a channel, he began working as an extra, and that contact with the sets ended up changing his life.

At Famosix we believe that origin explains a lot about his character. Yuca was never the loud comedian: he was the ordinary man, a little lost, on whom the absurd situation landed. That kind of humour works better coming from someone who knew office life than from someone raised on stage.

Yuca's professional career

The formal leap came in 1980, when Tulio Loza brought him into his show. That same year he joined Risas y Salsa, the most watched comedy show of the time on Panamericana, which also featured figures such as Camucha Negrete and Manolo Rojas. That is where the name that would stay with him forever was born.

The nickname was given to him by Adolfo Chuiman during a recording. Yuca used to tell how he came back on stage, the light was still on and Chuiman improvised by calling him that; people laughed and it stuck. He also linked it to the colour of his skin, sensitive to the sun.

In the mid-eighties he had an unexpected side: in 1986 he was the leading man of a photo novel alongside Monique Pardo.

But his name ended up tied to that of Jorge Benavides. He worked with him on almost all of his projects for more than thirty years, always as the supporting actor who held up the joke. On JB el imitador, in the early nineties, he crossed paths with a young Andrés Hurtado, who also took his first steps in television comedy there.

Main milestones of his career:

• 1980: debuts on television with Tulio Loza and joins Risas y Salsa
• 1986: stars in photo novels alongside Monique Pardo
• 1990-1993: is part of JB el imitador, on ATV
• 1994-2001: establishes himself on JB noticias, with sketches such as “Rambo” and “La jugada polémica”
• 2004: joins Los inimitables, Benavides' show that would later become El especial del humor
• 2011-2014: takes part in El especial del humor
• 2021-2025: is part of JB en ATV until his fall

Yuca's notable shows and projects

His career is almost a map of Peruvian television comedy over the last forty years. He went through the great sketch formats and accompanied Jorge Benavides through his different stages and channels.

Among his most remembered sketches are “La jugada polémica”, “Rambo” and “La farmacia”, which Benavides shared again on social media as a tribute after his death. He also took part in the universe of La paisana Jacinta and made the leap to film with ¡Asu mare! 2, the sequel starring Carlos Alcántara.

Yuca's personal life

Enrique Espejo was very private about his family life and there are no verified public details about a partner or children, so at Famosix we do not record any.

His name was, however, linked to a court case that is worth telling precisely. In 2019, the actress Clara Seminara publicly accused him of inappropriate touching during the recordings of El wasap de JB.

In January 2025, the judiciary issued a first-instance sentence of three years' suspended imprisonment and compensation of S/ 6,000. Espejo challenged it and his defence appealed, so the case continued in higher courts.

In January 2026, with the actor already in very poor health, Seminara announced that she was withdrawing the complaint on humanitarian grounds, which brought the case to an end.

At Famosix we record what is documented without value judgements: there was a complaint, an appealed first-instance sentence and a final withdrawal of the accusation because of his state of health.

Yuca trivia

• He was head of savings at a bank: he spent about ten years at Banco Hipotecario before dedicating himself to comedy.
• He started as an extra: he arrived on the sets while researching for his university thesis.
• He was not Perfudini: that character is Felpudini, played by Rodolfo Carrión, a colleague from Risas y Salsa who also died at the age of 75.
• He was a photo novel leading man: in 1986 he shared a cover with Monique Pardo.
• He was in the predecessor of El especial del humor: the show was first called Los inimitables, in 2004.
• He always wore long sleeves: he used to say the sun damaged his skin.
• He spent 35 years close to JB: from JB el imitador in 1990 to JB en ATV in 2025.

Yuca's legacy in 2026

His death, on September 11, 2026, prompted a wave of tributes from colleagues of different generations of Peruvian comedy, and his best-known sketches circulated again online within hours.

Much of the remembrance focused on “La jugada polémica”, which according to his colleagues was never the same without him, and on his ability to improvise without breaking the rhythm of the scene. That is the kind of merit that is almost never noticed on screen and that his colleagues highlighted first.

At Famosix we believe his case portrays well a type of career that television tends to forget: that of the supporting actor who makes the lead's joke work. Yuca was not the star of any show, but he was in almost all those that shaped four decades of Peruvian comedy. You can see more profiles in our biographies of Peruvian actors and in the ranking of Peruvian celebrities.

Conclusion

Yuca went from a desk at Banco Hipotecario to more than forty years of television comedy, almost always next to Jorge Benavides. He died at 75, after a very delicate year and a half since his fall in March 2025. At Famosix we record his career with documented facts.

Sources consulted

• Infobae: Murió Enrique Espejo, el popular Yuca, a los 75 años
• La República: Muere el comediante Enrique Espejo ‘Yuca’ a los 75 años tras larga batalla contra enfermedad
• El Comercio: Dejó la sucursal del banco por la TV: Enrique Espejo, ‘Yuca’, secundario con alma de estrella