Marcos Franz: "During 'Merlí' I had super aggressive behaviors with fans because I was completely altered"

Marcos Franz (Mataró, 1993) became famous thanks to his participation in Merlí, where he played Gerard. It was his gateway to television and the world of acting, but he did not enjoy it because at that time he was trapped in a manipulative relationship that destroyed him psychologically. The actor now talks about this experience in the book Cuando dejé de ser yo (Alienta Editorial).

In your book, you explain that when you started doing Merlí it was, in theory, your great professional moment. You experienced it as your worst moment. Why?

— Yes, because just when we were starting the rehearsals for Merlí, which we held at a summer camp house, I connected with a person with whom it seemed I would have a relationship that was going to be one of colleagues and friends. We got together creatively because he had studied screenwriting and I was an actor, and it seemed like maybe we could understand each other, create projects and things. And, little by little, over the months, everything became quite murky, quite dark. The guy did it very well, very slowly, he didn't spit it all out in five minutes. He explained to me that he came from a family that was in circles of power, in certain elites that controlled the world. He explained to me that all artists, musicians, actors, scientists, people who are part of the history and the narrative of humanity come from there and that they are all controlled to transmit certain discourses to society. All of this shook me up a lot, it made me think that the world I had known until that moment was completely false, that everything was artificial. I disconnected a lot. It caused me depersonalization and, finally, depression.

You define this relationship as one of manipulation and psychological abuse. Did it take you a long time to reach this conclusion?

— Yes, I did not arrive at this definition until after a long journey of abandoning that person, of blocking him and going away alone, to Madrid. Finally, when I returned here and did therapy, I did realize that it had been a relationship of psychological abuse.

Did he in some way control how you saw the world?

— Yes, exactly. I depended on him 100%. I felt that everything was hostile. He told me it was better not to listen to my colleagues from the series, not to listen to the directors, because they didn't know the true history of humanity and how the machinery worked. They were asleep people and he, on the other hand, did know all that. He told me they were pawns of society and that I shouldn't listen to them because otherwise I would end up like them. If I really wanted to free myself, I had to listen to him and follow him. This made me doubt everyone, hate everyone, and only be under this person's feet. I didn't listen to anyone else.

Amidst all this, Merlí made you famous. Was it easy to manage the popularity in that context?

— It was very difficult because several components came together. On one hand, there was the anxiety that the fanatical youth phenomenon can give you a little, which wasn't the most pleasant thing in the world. It is not the same for an adult to recognize you and congratulate you for your work as a group of girls screaming and chasing you. This added to all the anxiety and paranoia I had... Really, I had some super aggressive behaviors with fans, yelling at them and telling them that I didn't want to take a photo, for them to leave me alone, that they didn't know anything about me. I was completely agitated.

Throughout this descent into hell, was there anyone in your circle who realized what was happening to you?

— Yes, in the book I talk a lot about two people. One is Adrian Grösser, who is also an actor from Merlí. He did meet this person face to face and was one of the first people who told me: "Run away from this guy however you can". He tried to help me as best he could, but I was very trapped. And the other is Mauri, a very close friend of mine since adolescence who also helped me quite a bit to try to make me see the reality of things, but I was completely blind.

Did your parents also get to know him? How did they experience it?

— Yes, my parents met him and my mother made some comment to me, but it didn't go any further. With my family, I tried to hide it a lot. It was very strange, because, on one hand, I firmly believed in this person's discourse, but then when I was with my family I tried not to let it show. He also told me to try not to talk about it with anyone and to keep it quiet because they would call me crazy. His narrative was that I wasn't crazy, but rather that I was waking up.

The scenario you are describing has points of connection with sectarian behaviors. Is that so?

— Yes, I felt like I was in a cult, yes. But I wasn't inside a group, nor was there a room, or a lodge, or whatever they call it. It was a relationship between two people, in which he was my master. And we talked constantly on WhatsApp, he would warn me about what to do, what not to do, how to dress, how not to dress. He controlled absolutely everything, I had no voice.

You managed to cut off contact with that person, but you continued to not be okay psychologically.

— Exactly. Breaking up with this person does not automatically mean breaking up with everything they have put into your head, of course. I call it the parasite. In a way, there is a parasite that continues to eat away at your mind. And yes, no matter how much I broke up with that person, I was still following those ideas. Every day I told myself: "Don't believe him, don't listen to him, get that out of your head, tear it out however you can". I was talking to myself constantly, I even thought about calling him again and talking to him because I felt lost in the world and completely alone.

During this stage you also had drug consumption problems. Was it your way of escaping from yourself?

— Yes, I consumed a lot of alcohol. Maybe I would get drunk three days a week, but beastly drunks. I would have a beer and I felt it calmed my head. Everything I did, like consuming drugs such as diazepam or other drugs, were patches to cover the whole volcano I had in my head. Once the effect of the patch wore off, the pain was still there. It was a loop of falling, getting up, falling, getting up. I had to stop all that somehow.

In the book you talk about your ego and the need for power.

— As a child, I suffered from bullying. I felt very small, very despised, very lonely, with many doubts. All of this made me easily fall into the narrative of a person who told me they could understand everything that had happened to me and who explained to me that everything was due to circles of power that controlled humanity. They told me: "You are a sensitive person and you are capable of accessing a higher state. You are a special person". With this narrative, they hooked me.

How was the process of writing the book?

— I started in 2019, long before therapy. When I started writing I would shake, I would cry, I couldn't talk about the subject. I would block myself a lot. I stopped writing the book and started again in 2022. I started therapy in 2023, more or less, and in 2025, after two years, I felt much stronger mentally. And I said, now is the time, I wrote the book. Now I don't feel guilt, I don't feel shame, I don't feel all those emotional states that prevented me from being able to share this with the world.

Beyond this manipulative relationship, in the book you talk about the bad time that an actor from Merlí made you go through, whose real name you do not mention.

— Yes, I call him Miguel so that it doesn't resemble even a little bit any of the actors' names. I wanted to explain it, because he is a person who also hurt me a lot, hebullied me, not only on set, but also off set. It was also one of the reasons why I became a bit disillusioned with acting and I spent a few years, in fact, without working or going to castings. I mean, I spent perhaps three years without dedicating myself to it.

When you see images of Merlí now, what do you feel?

— [When I see them] I react, and not entirely positively. My system still relates Merlí to that whole era. And I cannot watch myself acting. In fact, the second season is the worst of all because it is when I was most deeply involved in the relationship. I can perhaps watch a scene with other actors, no problem, but if I see myself, I have a terrible time because I don't recognize myself in it, to be honest.