There are usually many Latinos trying to make their big leap into Hollywood.
Of course, not everyone makes it, and most of those who do achieve the American dream are usually from Mexico.
But the case of
Pedro Pascal
, a 47-year-old Chilean, the protagonist of the series
The Mandalorian
, on Disney+, and
The Last of Us
, whose first episode has just been released by HBO Max, is clearly particular.
José Pedro Balmaceda Pascal, born in Santiago de Chile on April 2, 1975, has worked in theater, both as an actor and director, and also on television and in movies, and if he became a US citizen, he was not, like other Mexicans, like Guillermo del Toro and Alejandro González Iñárritu, for those labor and union needs that they ask for in the country of the North.
Argentine contact.
Pascal was at the premiere of "Argentina, 1985" at the Venice Festival.
Photo Reuters
His first job, for which the international public paid attention to him, was for playing Prince Oberyn Martell in
Game of Thrones
. He was also Javier Peña in
Narcos
, the Netflix series, until he jumped to
The Mandalorian
, he was the villain of
Wonder Woman 1984
, and just as Channing Tatum was Tequila, he was Whiskey in
Kingsman: The Golden Circle
, and now we see him as Joel Miller, the father who lost his daughter and struggles to survive in the catastrophic and pandemic
The Last of Us
.
The adaptation of the video game of the same title is already a huge success:
its first episode became the most watched premiere in the history of HBO Max in Latin America
in its first 24 hours of availability.
a nomad
The son of a child psychologist and a fertility doctor, Pedro is the grandson of Spanish parents.
His parents sympathized with the socialist government of Salvador Allende, and when Pedro was born they were opponents of the dictatorial regime of Augusto Pinochet.
His mother, Verónica Pascal, is a relative of Andrés Pascal Allende, leader of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR).
They obtained political asylum in Denmark, and later moved to the United States.
At the premiere of the final season of "Game of Thrones" at Radio City Music Hall in New York, April 2019. AP Photo
The Pascals lived first in San Antonio, Texas, and later in Orange County, California.
Pedro was always tall and athletic, and even competed in Texas state championships as a swimmer.
And yes, he gave up swimming to take acting classes.
At the age of 18, he moved to New York, where he continued to perfect his dramatic studies, and, not least, while he was studying at New York University, his father experienced a scandal at the Orange County fertility clinic that he ran with two other doctors, and the family (father, mother, two younger sisters) returned to Chile.
Pedro Pascal, without the helmet with which he is almost always seen in "The Mandalorian".
His mother died shortly thereafter, and Pascal decided to use his mother's last name professionally.
According to him, not only to honor her: the Americans had difficulties when they had to pronounce her first name, Balmaceda.
Pedro does not live far from the reality of his native country, and although he did not vote in the last presidential elections, he expressed his public support for Gabriel Boric, who became president in 2021.
The first chapter of "The Last of Us" is the most watched in the history of HBO Max Latin America in the first 24 hours.
His career has been more active on television than in movies, appearing in popular series like
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
,
The Good Wife
,
Graceland
and even the third season of
Homeland
.
It was almost ten years ago, in June 2013, when he was hired to play Oberyn Martell, the "Red Viper", in the fourth season of
Game of Thrones
.
There weren't many episodes, only 7, but enough for the public, the critics and several producers to stop at it.
He remembers that he was a fan of the series, and when his agent told him that he had been called to audition for the role of the man who wants to avenge the bloody death of his sister, he couldn't believe it.
Nor was he recording all 17 pages of his audition on his iPhone.
"GOT": Pedro Pascal as Oberyn Martell and Bella Ramsey as Lyanna Mormont.
They act together again in "The Last of Us".
But Pedro is a very self-confident guy.
Pascal says, for this new series, also on HBO, he disobeyed the orders he was given and sat in his living room to play the video game.
They had asked her not to make contact with him, so that she would not influence his interpretation.
Well, Pedro believed that doing just the opposite was the right thing to do.
“I hadn't heard of the game,” he said.
The instruction (from HBO) was: Don't play.
I ignored them.
I tried to play and was very, very bad at it.
But my nephew was fantastic.
It was important for me to interpret situations that were directly related to what was originally in the game: physically, visually and even vocally.
With Bella Ramsey, at the red carpet of the premiere of "'The Last of Us".
Photo EFE
The series takes place from the end of its first episode in the present time, but after the world has succumbed to a strange disease, which transforms human beings into savage, devouring and murderous beasts.
Joel meets Ellie (Bella Ramsey) by chance, and must take her to a specific place.
Thus ended the first chapter of the 9 that this first season will have, and that HBO Max will premiere every Sunday at 11:00 p.m.
And the same week that
The Last of Us
premiered , Disney+ announced the premiere date for the third season of
The Mandalorian
.
It will be from Wednesday, March 1, when we see him, with his helmet in most episodes, yes, hiding his face, as the lonely bounty hunter who meets Grogu, the Baby Yoda who won the hearts of all fans. of
Star Wars
, of which
The Mandalorian
is by far the best spin-off ever made.
Along with Nicolas Cage, in "The Weight of Talent": he can also do comedy.
Photo File Clarín
And in May he will travel to the Cannes Festival, where he will present his new work, directed by Pedro Almodóvar.
It is a short film,
Strange Way of Life
, a gay western in which his character, the cowboy Silva, crosses the desert on horseback to meet up with an old friend (Ethan Hawke), with whom a quarter of a century ago they were gunmen.
Flexible in the action and comedy genre (did you see
The Weight of Talent
last year , in which he accompanies Nicolas Cage?), his future seems more promising than his brilliant past.
look too
Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie are a fire in Babylon
Argentina, 1985 and another key nomination in his Oscar career
