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SÃO PAULO, SP (FOLHAPRESS) – It is rare, but it happens. Pedro Pascal, an actor almost exclusively of TV, who is already 50 years old, suddenly becomes everyone’s favorite human being. It’s a similar trajectory to another everyone’s favorite, this one perhaps two decades ago – George Clooney.
Like Pedro, George moved from TV to cinema when he made his first successful film, “From Dusk till Dawn,” by Robert Rodriguez, with a script by Quentin Tarantino. He was 34 years old. Making this transition near 50, being Latino, as is the case with Chilean Pedro Pascal, is a thousand times less likely.
And here it is. Just in this remainder of 2025, for example, Pascal has three feature films ready, waiting for their premiere. Two of them still this month. The first one is “Fantastic Four: First Steps,” in which he plays Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards, the leader of the group. It will be in cinemas starting July 24th. A week later, his first romantic comedy, “Material Girls,” with Dakota Johnson, will enter the circuit.
At some point during the second half of the year, the western film “Eddington,” directed by Ari Aster, featuring Joaquin Phoenix and Emma Stone, who have three Oscars between them, will be released. The film had its world premiere at the last Cannes Film Festival, and an interaction between Pascal and Phoenix became a meme and the subject of much speculation.
At the end of the film’s gala premiere, as is customary, the cast stands up to thank the audience, which applauds both the movie and the presence of the stars. And then, in the middle of all that commotion, Pedro grabbed his colleague’s arm and said something in his ear. Phoenix apparently responded with an “Alright, man.” And then the internet went crazy. What could Pedro have said?
Experts in lip reading were called in to decipher the secret phrase, and without either of them confirming, it was established that Pascal was guarding his colleague’s image, who was waving to the audience with a hand at an angle that could be misinterpreted, as if making a Nazi salute. The fact is that Phoenix stopped waving and just smiled.
And there’s also the indie favorite “Freaky Tales,” which was a hit at last year’s Sundance Festival, released in US cinemas in May this year and is expected to arrive in our theaters at some point. This action comedy takes place in 1980s California, and Pascal plays Clint, a loan shark trying to change his life when he finds out he’s going to be a father.
On TV, his natural habitat, Pascal revives his tough and paternal hero Joel Miller from “The Last of Us,” one of the last survivors of the human race after a pandemic destroyed almost all of civilization. He takes responsibility for caring for a teenager, Ellie Williams, played by actress Bella Ramsey, who may be the only chance for our species to continue existing.
Joel Miller, his character in the series, is one of the reasons why Pedro Pascal has the nickname “Daddy,” or “papai” (daddy in Portuguese), on the internet. Din Djarin, the protagonist of the series “The Mandalorian,” on the Disney+ streaming channel, which Pedro Pascal has portrayed since 2019, is a bounty hunter in the bizarre universe of Star Wars. He is another quiet character, but one you can count on if you are loyal. “The Mandalorian” has also become a movie, with a release scheduled for next year.
The protective, affectionate, funny yet with a sadness in his eyes, something like a lost dog on moving day, which Pascal refines every day, leads the audience to complete the scene with whatever fantasy dictates. And everyone goes crazy, wanting more.
Something about him seems to transcend any barrier—whether age or gender. It doesn’t matter if the audience watches him acting in the series that made him famous, “Game of Thrones,” specifically in its fourth season, which aired in 2014, or if they only come into contact with images of him dancing in Apple’s new headphone commercial, playing with his fellow cast members, or proudly bringing his transgender sister as his date to Hollywood’s most popular parties, where he wears the most fun outfits—like the red suit with short pants, red overcoat, and boots, all by Valentino, which he wore at the 2023 Met Gala.
One of these co-stars with whom Pascal developed a strong friendship was Wagner Moura, in “Narcos” from 2015. While Moura played the protagonist, the drug dealer Pablo Escobar, a role for which he had to gain about 20 kilograms, Pascal portrayed the police officer Javier Peña, who was not exactly a heartthrob, but much more handsome.
Although he spent most of his life in New York, the city where his family moved after spending some time in Denmark, fleeing from Pinochet’s dictatorship in Chile, which began with a coup d’etat in 1973 and ended in 1990, and although he started acting at the age of 16, Pascal spent a long time without being able to find any work.
By the way, born in 1975 in Santiago, Chile, Pascal made his acting debut in the 21st century, specifically in the year 2000. And in theater. He graduated in dramatic arts from New York University, a prestigious university, where he met and became friends with Sarah Paulson, who always encouraged him and practically prevented him from giving up, even when nothing seemed to happen in his life.
He even did cameos in successful series like “Buffy: The Vampire Slayer” and “Law and Order,” but nothing made the public remember his name or face. It took 14 years of long waiting until he was cast as Prince Oberyn Martell, “The Red Viper,” in the phenomenon series “Game of Thrones,” in 2014. It was just eight episodes, but since then the world has woken up.
There is an urban legend, or rather, an internet one, which claims that Pascal hides his romantic relationships, which he strongly denies. A three-hour dinner at a restaurant in West Hollywood with Jennifer Aniston in March of this year almost created an organized group supporting their union, although they both swear they are just good friends.
Pascal, like most of his characters, has never been married and does not have children. He has no well-known ex-girlfriend or ex-boyfriend from many years ago, as far as is known. In other words, he’s still on the market. At least in the imagination of much of the planet’s population. If it’s all a marketing move, it’s brilliant.
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