Pedro Pascal

José Pedro Balmaceda Pascal (born April 2, 1975) is a Chilean and American actor.

José Pedro Balmaceda Pascal was born on April 2, 1975, in Santiago, Chile to child psychologist Verónica Pascal Ureta and fertility doctor José Balmaceda Riera.

His paternal grandmother was born in Palma de Mallorca, Spain.

He has an older sister named Javiera, a younger brother named Nicolás, and a younger sister named Lux, who is an actress and transgender activist.

Pascal's mother was the cousin of Andrés Pascal Allende, the nephew of socialist Chilean President Salvador Allende (through his sister Laura).

Pascal Allende was an early leader of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left, a militant far-left organization.

Nine months after his birth, his family sought refuge in the Venezuelan embassy in Santiago, and later received political asylum in Denmark.

Ultimately, the family moved to the United States, where Pascal was raised in San Antonio, Texas, until they relocated to Orange County, California, when he was 11 years old.

By the time he was eight years old, his family regularly visited Chile to see his 34 cousins.

He pursued acting at the Orange County School of the Arts and graduated in 1993, before attending New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where he graduated in 1997.

After his mother's death, he began using her surname professionally as a tribute to her and because he felt that Americans had difficulty pronouncing his paternal surname, Balmaceda.

Pascal has appeared in several television series, including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Good Wife, Homeland, The Mentalist, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and Graceland.

He made his directorial debut with play underneathmybed in 2008.

He also directed Yosemite and Killing Play at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater.

He is a member of New York City's LAByrinth Theater Company.

In 2010, he wrote a play, directed by Sarah Silverman, Flaca Loves Bone, about four siblings who meet in a snowy wood to uncover a family secret.

He was cast in the pilot for the 2011 Wonder Woman television adaptation, but the show was not picked up.

Pascal has extensive stage experience as both an actor and director; he received the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award and Garland Award for his role in the International City Theater production of Orphans, and has performed in classical and contemporary works.

After nearly two decades of taking small roles in film and television, Pascal rose to prominence for portraying Oberyn Martell in the fourth season of the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones (2014) and Javier Peña in the Netflix crime series Narcos (2015–2017).

In 2014, Pascal portrayed the character Oberyn Martell in the fourth season of the HBO's critically acclaimed television series Game of Thrones.

The season aired from April 6 to June 15, 2014, and Pascal's performance as the passionate and vengeful Prince of Dorne garnered significant praise from both critics and audiences.

Pascal stated that he was a huge fan of the show before being cast as Oberyn and was ecstatic to join.

As part of the ensemble, he has received a Screen Actors Guild Awards nomination for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series.

In the 2015 movie, Bloodsucking Bastards, Pascal portrayed the vampire Max.

In April 2015, Pascal co-starred with Heidi Klum in the music video for Sia's "Fire Meet Gasoline".

In August 2015, Pascal gained further recognition for his portrayal as Javier Peña, based on a real-life DEA agent, in the popular Netflix crime drama series Narcos.

The show's two first seasons depict the rise and fall of the infamous drug lord Pablo Escobar and the subsequent Medellín Cartel, as the show's focus shifted to the Cali Cartel for its third and final season, Pascal took on the role of both lead actor and narrator.

He went on to appear in the films The Great Wall (2016), Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017), The Equalizer 2 (2018), Triple Frontier (2019), Wonder Woman 1984 (2020), and The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022).

In 2016, he portrayed mercenary Pero Tovar in the fantasy action film The Great Wall, alongside Matt Damon, and directed by Zhang Yimou.

Set against the backdrop of the iconic Great Wall of China, the film follows European mercenaries who become embroiled in a battle against ancient creatures threatening humanity.

Despite the film's visually stunning production and ambitious scope, it received mixed reviews for its narrative and character development.

Filmed on location in Qingdao, China.

Pascal has voiced his admiration for Yimou, whom he's been a fan of growing up.

In 2017, Pascal portrayed the charismatic and skilled operative within the Statesman organization, Jack Daniels, also known as Agent Whiskey, in Matthew Vaughn's Kingsman: The Golden Circle.

In 2018, he starred as Dave York, the main antagonist, in Denzel Washington's thriller sequel film The Equalizer 2.

In Prospect, Pascal portrayed the character Ezra, a seasoned and enigmatic prospector navigating a dangerous alien moon in search of valuable resources.

In 2018's If Beale Street Could Talk, directed by Barry Jenkins and based on James Baldwin's novel, Pascal made a cameo appearance as Pietro Alvarez, a frivolous yet crucial character who ultimately reveals a compassionate and empathetic side.

Since 2019, Pascal has starred as the title character in the Disney+ Star Wars series The Mandalorian, a role he reprised in The Book of Boba Fett (2022).

In 2023, he played Joel Miller in the HBO drama series The Last of Us, for which he won a Screen Actors Guild Award and received nominations for a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award.

Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2023.