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Charo says it’s “impossible to fight time” so she’s become its “friend.”
“If you cannot win, join them,” “The Love Boat” actress and “Cuchi Cuchi” singer told Fox News Digital of aging.
The 75-year-old added that doing “drugs is out of the question” if you want to stay youthful and vibrant.
“I like action,” she said, explaining that she’s always going for a run, writing music or practicing.
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Charo says she’s always on the move. (Santiago Felipe/Getty Images; Harry Langdon/Getty Images)
“So in my case, if you give me marijuana, I’m gonna be like, ‘Everything is beautiful,’” she said languidly, doing an impression of herself stoned. “So I don’t take it. I don’t take a drug.”
She added that pot puts her to sleep. “I want to be alert. I want to be alive.”
“I drink water, good wine,” she continued. “Wait a minute, don’t misconstrue me. Good wine and a good dinner is perfectly welcome because wine is nature, it comes from the grapes. But I don’t do drugs and I do some exercise and I try to think positive.”
WATCH: Charo shares her secrets to staying youthful at 75
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The guitarist revealed that she also doesn’t smoke cigarettes, which she credits for helping her maintain youthful skin.
“So I have all of this on my side,” she said.
Charo with Sonny Bono in 1974. (Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images)
“But yes, vegetables, exercise,” she recommended. “If you have to go [out] into the sun, I love Hawaii and the sunshine, then put [on] protection, but enjoy. Enjoy jumping into the water and swimming and have fun because nature is priceless. But yeah, take care of yourself and exercise, exercise. Cut the gluten and the fried, exercise, no more sugar and apple pie.”
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Charo said she practices her guitar a minimum of three hours a day and runs for an hour, too to “be skinny.”
WATCH: Charo describes visiting nonprofit Farm Sanctuary as like being on ‘another planet’
“I came to America to make money to eat. Now that I make money, I cannot eat,” she joked.
Take care of yourself and exercise, exercise. Cut the gluten and the fried, exercise, no more sugar and apple pie.”
She also insists that flamenco [dancing] is the best exercise for osteoporosis.
Charo at an event in 2024. (Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images)
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“Every time you step on the floor or on the stage you stimulate calcium for your leg,” she said, adding that no one in her family has osteoporosis, but she often sees young girls who are already getting it because they sit all day at a computer and never exercise.
“It’s very important to do a stretch,” she added. “It’s very important to put your body in movement. She also explained that it’s important to have good posture, especially when working at a computer.
Charo said she has a “great recipe for people. Lentil soup from mi abuela, my grandma. It’s the best nutrition, iron, potassium, magnesium: lentil soup.”
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She also eats lots of vegetables and fruit, and “I like chocolate. I am completely addicted to dark chocolate. I don’t drink coffee because if I drink coffee … you will have to [call] 911,” she joked. “Woo hoo! But dark chocolate, once in a while, it makes you happy.”
Charo on an episode of “The Love Boat” in 1981. (ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content)
“If we fight against time and if we do it in the right way and God help us, you feel healthier all the time,” she said.
Sharing some wisdom from her family, she said her mother used to tell her: “Si quieres lucir, tienes que sufrir,” which means, “if you want to look good … and people say, ‘Wow! She’s a hot tamale!’ you have to suffer.”
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The musician, who maintains a vegetarian diet, recently received the Compassionate Impact Award from Farm Sanctuary, a nonprofit that rescues farm animals.
“I love animals. No offense, but I love more animals than people,” Charo joked. “Because we the people have a lot of issue and the animals have no issue. It’s just survive and love.”
Charo said that before she moved to Hawaii, she visited Farm Sanctuary’s Southern California shelter two to three times a month.
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“They’re very, very special people,” she said, adding that “people should go and take their children and see beautiful animals, that they have a chance to revive and survive and get to know how nice we are, the humans.”
The “Cuchi, Cuchi” singer called visiting the sanctuary like being on “another planet where people are extra nice, “and you see little chickens and turkeys walking around you, not afraid. You see a lot of horses. I was impressed to see a horse with glasses. I said, ‘What the hell is this? This is Hollywood.’” She said she was told the horse actually had a problem with its eyes and needed to wear protective eye wear.
The Spanish native added that she grew up on a farm in Spain near a bullfighting ring, a practice she is fighting to end.
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Charo at the Mercy for Animals gala in 2024. (Tommaso Boddi/Variety)
“People don’t enjoy to see the sacrifice [of] an innocent animal when they can have fun watching other things,” she explained.
Her love of animals even led her to adopt a young calf named Manolo who she raised at her house in Beverly Hills after filming an anti-bullfighting PSA with him.
“And when the video was over, we fell in love with the bull, and we brought it to the house,” she explained. “And we give it food and love.”
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She even wrote a song for Manolo.
“Manolo, baby bull, your mother was a b—-. She leave you alone, but baby, don’t you cry cause you find a better home,” she sang, adding that Manolo danced while she sang to him.
“The bull grow up here and became huge,” she said. “And it was all the neighbor calling the police and tell them, we smell el toro poo poo from Charo’s backyard. And I said, this is bulls— . My baby bull wears Pampers.”
But she said the authorities were understanding.
“God bless the police department, that they give us some time to find a home,” she said, explaining that eventually Manolo moved to a place in Malibu formerly owned by John Wayne where they train horses.
“Manolo became a hero,” she added, saying he was the “representation of how kind these animals can be. They are kind, they cry, they feel afraid. They feel love.”
Dean Martin hosts the Celebrity Roast of Ed McMahon on “The Dean Martin Comedy Hour” with Dom DeLuise, Charo, Dionne Warwick, and Ernest Borgnine. (Gary Null/NBC NewsWire)
After Manolo left Beverly Hills, the once frustrated neighbors were “so sad,” she said, “because they was coming and saying, ‘Manolo, como estas, how are you?’ So we changed Beverly Hills for a while.”
“And I am grateful to the police that they like Manolo and they say, ‘OK, you got to move Manolo, but take your time,’” she said. “I want to thank them … how nice they were, the police department. And at the end of the complaining, everybody loved Manolo.”
Asked if she’s considered getting her own farm, the busy musician answered, “One day.”
“I am lucky if I catch four or five hours,” she said. “My life suck because I don’t know how to say ‘no.’ This is a problem. When you work so hard to make it, to make your dream, and your dream is there, there, and then you wanna keep on your dream.”
She said she has also recently befriended some raccoons that come near her house.
“Don’t get near a raccoon because they told me that if they get pissed off, you’re gonna get it,” she warned. “So, you got to respect the distance. But at night, the raccoons come to where I live. They know where I live. They go around and they wait with patience to eat the dinner that I put there.”
One of the raccoons even looks like her, she joked.
WATCH: Charo describes raising a bull named Manolo in Beverly Hills
“He’s really cute,” she laughed, “and he tried to be friendly. We respect each other. I always put about seven feet or a little bit more distance, but every time he tried to get closer and closer. And it is a beautiful animal. Don’t do like me, don’t get near, OK? Because they can bite you. But I noticed from my neighbor that now the raccoons are trying to be more close to the human, seriously.”
Charo also had advice for the younger generation, hoping that Gen Z will stay in touch with nature, remembering her own experience growing up on a farm in Spain.
“The nature was kicking and alive,” she said of her childhood.
As far as her career, the musician calls herself “Speedy Gonzales.”
“I am recording a brand new CD called The Best of Charo because people have fun with the ‘Cuchi Cuchi.’ ‘Cuchi Cuchi’ show me to the bank, thank you, but my passion is the guitar,” she explained. “And I am recording now beautiful music. Music that go to your heart and make you be happy to be alive and make you happy to enjoy what nature offer us. It’s going to be a huge success.”
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She’s also heading out on tour starting in June with “The Best of Charo.”
Reflecting on her acting career, Charo says, “the best 10 years of my life was at ‘The Love Boat.’ I get pregnant at the love boat. It was not the captain,” she joked. “It was my husband. The people, the cast, are my best friends.”
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The singer reunited with the cast, minus the captain played by Gavin MacLeod who died in 2021, for a special sail celebrating Princess Cruises last year.
Charo in the TV movie “Charo and the Sergeant” in 1976. (Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images)
“All the guys were there except, of course, the captain, rest in peace, pass away. It was so beautiful,” she said. “People came from Europe, they came from Barcelona, they came from France, they come from everywhere. It was a special cruise, and the audience was looking for fun.”
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She continued, “To me, and to a lot of people, ‘The Love Boat’ was the best production show, entertainment, from Mr. Aaron Spelling … We love each other.”
Charo revealed that she wasn’t given a script on the show. She said she was given an idea of what she needed to do in a scene, and then they told her to “Take over!”
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“So they give me freedom to feel at home,” she said, remembering one memorable episode where she claimed she looked like a “watermelon in heels” because she was eight months pregnant.
“Aaron Spelling is the king of every people in show business,” Charo stated of the show’s creator, saying he gave “each performer, actor, actress an opportunity. He will never die … He controlled all the network, but he give opportunity to actor, actress, musician, comedian, God bless him. It’s the best thing ever happened to Hollywood.”