NEED TO KNOW
Spanish actress Verónica Echegui has died following a secret cancer diagnosis. She was 42.
Echegui — known for Apple TV+’s Love You To Death, the Netflix series Intimacy and Sky thriller Fortitude — died on Sunday, Aug. 24, at Madrid’s 12 de Octubre University Hospital where she was being treated for cancer, according to Variety and local media outlet El País.
According to the outlets, only those closest to Echegui knew that she was ill and she had been hospitalized in recent days.
PEOPLE has reached out to representatives of Echegui for comment.
Those paying tribute to the star following her death, included actor Antonio Banderas and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.
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Sharing a photo of Echegui kissing an award on a red carpet, Banderas, 65, wrote on Instagram, “Today, Spanish cinema mourns the passing of Verónica Echegui. My condolences to her family and friends. 🙏 #RIP @veronicaechegui.”
“I was deeply shocked by the news of Verónica Echegui’s passing, an actress with enormous talent and humility who leaves us far too young,” Sánchez, 53, shared in a post on X alongside the El País article announcing her death.
“My sincere embrace in these such difficult moments for the entire family and friends,” he added.
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Born in Madrid in 1983, Echegui got her break thanks to late Spanish director Bigas Luna, who is also credited with Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem’s breakthroughs, per Variety. The actress stared in Luna’s 2006 film, My Name Is Juani, earning her the first of her four Spanish Academy nominations.
She then made her Hollywood debut in 2012‘s The Cold Light of Day alongside Bruce Willis, Sigourney Weaver and Henry Cavill. Echegui played Cavill’s half-sister, Lucia Caldera, a receptionist who ends up assisting Cavill’s character, Will Shaw, after his family is kidnapped in Spain by foreign agents.
Echegui’s career also saw her star in 2009’s Bunny and the Bull alongside The Great British Baking Show host Noel Fielding and the 2022 Prime Video romcom Book of Love with Sam Claflin, playing the Mexican translator for Claflin’s British novelist.
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According to Variety, Claflin, 39, reacted to the news of Echegui’s by posting on social media: “I’m heartbroken hearing the news about the magical @veronicaechegui. F— you cancer.”
Perhaps Echegui’s most notable roles were in a string of TV series, including the Sky thriller Fortitude, in which she played Elena Ledesma alongside Stanley Tucci, Dennis Quaid and the late Michael Gambon for two seasons, from 2015 to 2016.
This was followed by the 2017 Netflix series Apaches and 2018 FX drama Trust starring the late Donald Sutherland and Hilary Swank. Echegui’s most recent on-screen role was in the romcom series Love You To Death, which was released on Apple TV+ in February 2025.
