Pedro Pascal, at 50, enjoys immense popularity. His roles in ‘The Mandalorian’ and ‘The Last of Us’ made him famous. The actor is also known for his unique fashion sense and he embraces the ‘daddy’ moniker given by fans. He started his acting career in the 90s with small roles. At 50, Pedro Pascal is basking in a new wave of fame. With global hits like The Mandalorian and The Last of Us, he’s not just a fan favourite but the internet’s self-declared “cool daddy.” The actor has social media under his spell, courtesy his red carpet looks. “I am a heartthrob,” he said with a laugh in a recent interview – and no one’s arguing. Pascal, the style iconIf you have not watched Pedro’s shows or movies, or are not yet knee-deep in love with the internet’s favourite ‘boyfriend’, he will give you plenty of reasons to fall for him like he recently did at the Cannes Film Festival 2025.In a room full of tuxedos, the actor, promoting his upcoming film Eddington, showed up in a plunging tank top, flared trousers, and studded loafers.For the Fantastic Four reboot trailer launch, he wore a Bode shirt covered in international flags. His stylist Julie Ragolia wrote on Instagram, “If the world’s going to shit, we’re just gonna cuddle it.” He also attended the premiere of Marvel’s Thunderbolts wearing a “Protect the Dolls” T-shirt, highlighting his support for trans rights on one of the biggest public stages. At Met Gala 2023, he told the world how to rock a pair of formal shorts as he turned up in a custom red-and-black Valentino outfit.’I am an immigrant. I want to live on the right side of history’Another side of the Pedro Pascal phenomenon is his off-screen candour – like his recent remarks on deportations in the US. “I want people to be safe and to be protected. I want to live on the right side of history,” he said. “I am an immigrant. My parents are refugees from Chile. We fled a dictatorship and I was privileged enough to grow up in the United States after asylum in Denmark. If it weren’t for that, I don’t know what would have happened to us,” he continued. “I stand by those protections always.” He doesn’t flinch before calling Game of Thrones a “double eyesore,” and proudly stood by Wonder Woman 1984, even when others distanced themselves. Pedro wrote on X, “I love movies and I love Wonder Woman 1984,” when the film faced a swathe of negative reviews.He’s also unafraid of vulnerability. As his The Last of Us co-actor Melanie Lynskey once said, “There’s just nothing wrong with him.”During a Vanity Fair interview, his joy was infectious and his honesty a rarity. He admitted he searched himself on X and recalled one post that read, “Pedro Pascal looks like Orlando Bloom if he was hit in the face with a shovel.” Asked if he agreed, he laughed and replied, “Sometimes.” He also scrolls through Pedro Pascal fan accounts on Instagram “to lift his spirits on a gloomy day.”It isn’t actually his Adonis form you’re responding to. It’s the beauty he carries inside. His interior light burns so bright, it’s simply taken some time for your eyes to adjust. But now that you’ve seen him, you know too- Sarah Paulson, Pedro’s long-time friend and actress, in Time’s The 100 Most Influential People of 2023 list Pedro Pacal – Internet’s ‘It’ daddyThe success of the post-apocalyptic drama The Last of Us and the third season of the live-action series The Mandalorian in 2023 prompted many of his fans to crown him “the internet’s daddy” – a title he embraced sportingly. “Yeah, I am having fun with it,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. In one of his red carpet interviews, Pedro even said, “Yep, I am your cool, sl***y daddy.” In The Last of Us, he plays a man protecting a surrogate daughter in a zombie-infested world. In The Mandalorian, he dons the armour of a lone bounty hunter safeguarding the beloved Grogu. It’s likely this mix of grit and emotional depth – a tough exterior with a tender heart – that makes Pascal’s screen presence so magnetic.A star, three decades in the makingHe may be getting the attention now but Pedro Pascal has been around since the 90s. The Chile-born actor began his career in his early 20s and popped up in tiny roles on the iconic Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Good Wife, and various Law & Order episodes. While looking for acting assignments, Pedro worked as a waiter at restaurants and was “terrible” at his job. “I was fired from my waiter job, maybe close to 10 times,” he once admitted.”I’ve been auditioning since I was 20, working as a waiter, getting theatre gigs, doing the Law and Orders,” Pedro, who studied acting at NYU but found fame only after he played the doomed bisexual, Oberyn Martell, on Game of Thrones in 2014, told Time Magazine.The actor’s stardom was almost 30 years in the making, with a slow and meandering acting career. “The smallest of opportunities kept me going,” Pedro told The New York Times in 2017. “So much so that I resolved to struggle until I couldn’t walk anymore.”But since his brief, yet memorable, performance in GoT, the Pedro Pascal world has grown with all of us getting residency.In 2015, he ensured he wouldn’t be forgotten again as he captivated audiences playing the smooth-talking, tight-trouser-wearing DEA agent Javier Peña in Narcos, one of Netflix’s early Originals.With his uncanny ability to make every character his own, Pedro grew from being just a TV actor to a global sensation. Today, he is touted as the poster boy for late bloomers.Between 2016 and 2019, Pascal featured in legendary Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou’s American debut The Great Wall, the Denzel Washington-led action sequel The Equalizer 2, and Netflix’s high-octane B-movie Triple Frontier. Add to that the impressive box office haul of Kingsman: The Golden Circle, and these titles together raked in close to a billion dollars worldwide – that’s over Rs 7,000 crore.Just when the world started drooling over his looks, he hid his face behind a chrome helmet in Disney’s The Mandalorian, a bold move by an actor who had just found his groove. It paid off.Coming soon: Even more Pedro on your screens1. The Fantastic Four: First Steps2. Avengers: Doomsday3. The Mandalorian & Grogu4. Materialists5. Eddington
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