Pedro Pascal Got Fired A Lot

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Speaker 5 This is Fresh Air. I'm Tanya Mosley.
If you've watched TV, gone to the movies, or even glanced at a bus stop ad in the past year, you've probably seen Pedro Pascal staring back at you.

Speaker 5 This summer alone, his face has been splashed across posters and billboards for the fantastic Four First Steps, Eddington, and Celine Song's Materialists.

Speaker 5 He's also gearing up for Avengers Doomsday, and that's on top of an Emmy nomination for his role as Joel in HBO's The Last of Us.

Speaker 5 In the past decade, Pascal has become one of Hollywood's most magnetic leading men.

Speaker 5 often playing reluctant protectors like in The Mandalorian and The Last of Us, who find find family in the unlikeliest of places.

Speaker 5 That connection between found family on screen and his own life came into sharp focus during his Saturday Night Live monologue in 2023, when he credited his parents for making sacrifices to bring him to the United States from South America, a journey that began with political exile and helped shape a career defined in part by portraying outsiders finding their way in.

Speaker 5 That combination of personal history and on-screen vulnerability has made him something rare in Hollywood, a star that people feel like they know. A recent New Yorker cartoon captured it perfectly.

Speaker 5 A therapist tells a client, it's not strange at all. Lately, a lot of people are reporting that their faith in humanity is riding entirely on whether or not Pedro Pascal is as nice as he seems.

Speaker 5 Pedro Pascal, welcome to Fresh Air.

Speaker 3 You will have to assess and share with everybody whether this is true, I suppose.

Speaker 5 Well, I think we're getting off to a great start. Congratulations on your Emmy nomination.
It's a really big deal for you.

Speaker 3 Oh, gosh. Thanks very much.
Thank you.

Speaker 5 Well, let's talk about The Last of Us. So I want to get folks up to speed if they don't know it.

Speaker 5 The Last of Us is based on this hit video game set in this post-apocalyptic America, overrun by this fungal outbreak that turns people into the deadly infected. So basically like zombies on steroids.

Speaker 5 And at its core, it's about your character, Joel, who is really contending with the loss of his daughter and trying to survive in spite of all of this.

Speaker 5 And Ellie, a teenage girl, you all connect, and she might be humanity's last hope.

Speaker 5 We've watched you guys survive these impossible circumstances. And then season two happens, and I'm going to spoil it.
You die very early on in a very brutal way. And I was completely blindsided.

Speaker 5 I know you have heard this before, but I actually had to take a break for a moment. Sure.
Because it was so much.

Speaker 5 Even for you, it was a lot to see your character die.

Speaker 3 I understand. I mean, it's happened to me on other shows I've watched.
I've had to take breaks whenever they throw these kinds of blindsides. Yeah.
It's very sadistic to be attached to something.

Speaker 3 They know it. And they play with us

Speaker 3 and we stick around.

Speaker 5 Right, you know it in taking on the role.

Speaker 3 I did, yeah. So that's kind of how, and of course, the whole world of gaming really opened up to me when I took on this part.
So it was just such a monumentally successful video game.

Speaker 3 And the medium of storytelling within this, within gaming, is also very sophisticated and more and more so over the last, you know, decade.

Speaker 5 It's a cinematic experience in itself playing the video game.

Speaker 3 And also a very literary one as well, because of how complex the stories can be. And so all kinds of genres.

Speaker 3 And this one obviously really being unique in how kind of grounded it was in its human characters, right?

Speaker 3 And the more skill you have at playing the game, the more you can unlock the story as it unfolds, right?

Speaker 3 Because my nephews lost their minds when...

Speaker 3 when they found out that I'd gotten this job and I hadn't heard of it.

Speaker 3 I hadn't heard of the game.

Speaker 5 You tell this funny story where they weren't just excited. They were like,

Speaker 3 yeah, they were like screaming. They were really, I called my older sister and they were in the car and I was on speaker and I didn't even get the four words out.

Speaker 3 I just got the last and they were like, the last of us.

Speaker 3 You got to do it. You know?

Speaker 3 And so that being said, because of the nature of what the character story arc is and how structured it is on the adaptation, it was always a one-season deal. Oh.

Speaker 3 And then the second season would be very committed to the second part of the game, and that it was all pretty mapped out in terms of like...

Speaker 5 Your character was for a finite amount of time, you're going to die.

Speaker 3 Yeah, and that he was going to go early, like he does in the experience of the game.

Speaker 5 So in season two, you have now connected deeply with Ellie, who is a young girl, 16 years old, who might hold the key to curing this fungus that has taken over the world. She's immune to it.

Speaker 5 And you all are on this journey together. You meet up and you're connected.
And so you're moving through this world together.

Speaker 5 And you make this choice that changes the ability for her to actually maybe be the person that could provide the cure.

Speaker 5 And so in this scene, which is a spoiler, you explain to her why you've made the choices that you've made to keep her in the relationship with you instead of possibly being the person that could provide the cure.

Speaker 5 Let's listen.

Speaker 3 Making a cure

Speaker 3 would have killed you.

Speaker 5 Then I was supposed to die. That was my purpose.
My life would have mattered, but you took that from me.

Speaker 5 You took it from everyone.

Speaker 3 Yes.

Speaker 3 And I'll pay the price.

Speaker 3 Because you're going to turn away from me.

Speaker 3 But if somehow I had a second chance at that moment,

Speaker 3 I would do it all over again.

Speaker 3 Because you're selfish.

Speaker 3 Because I love you.

Speaker 3 in a way you

Speaker 3 can't understand.

Speaker 3 Maybe you never will.

Speaker 3 But if that day should come,

Speaker 3 if you should ever have one of your own,

Speaker 3 Well then,

Speaker 3 I hope you do a little better than me.

Speaker 5 Man, look at us. We're about to start crying in the studio.

Speaker 5 That was my guest today. Pedro Pascal in season two of The Last of Us.

Speaker 5 Ellie goes on to say to you, I don't think I can forgive you, but I'm going to try.

Speaker 5 When When you think back to that choice, Joel choosing to keep her alive, to love her and for his own comfort over those other bigger things, the greater good for society, because she might hold a cure for this fungal thing that's spreading across the world.

Speaker 5 How do you see him now? Like, do you see his decision as selfish or something more complicated?

Speaker 3 You know, it's interesting. I think that the primary way that I was able to understand it is that it isn't a choice.

Speaker 3 He is incapable of losing her

Speaker 3 and

Speaker 3 incapable of

Speaker 3 processing in a rational way

Speaker 3 what would be a profound sacrifice for him for the greater good. It is not

Speaker 3 something he is able to understand because of all of his unprocessed grief and loss over

Speaker 3 his original daughter that he was unable to save, that he's lived with. That is literally the kind of defining factor of his adult identity post-apocalypse.

Speaker 3 He is the man that didn't save his daughter's life.

Speaker 3 And he, before that, he was the man that lived for his daughter's life.

Speaker 3 And so

Speaker 3 once he's stepped stepped into

Speaker 3 reluctantly but

Speaker 3 inevitably into that kind of a relationship again, he's incapable of giving her up.

Speaker 3 And I could imagine, so I can't objectively say that that's the right thing to do.

Speaker 3 And given

Speaker 3 any kind of like, you know, God forbid any of us find ourselves in circumstances like these. Right, right.

Speaker 3 You would just hope that you would do, you know, the right thing, but who knows what any of us would be capable of when it is related to love

Speaker 3 and grief and loss and trauma and all those things. And so

Speaker 3 I was always like, well, he didn't have a choice, you know, even though he very clearly did. But not one that he

Speaker 3 was in relationship to. It's almost like his own

Speaker 3 body could only see one way. I just don't know what my initial instinct would be, but I would sort of like want to nurture a mind that knows that

Speaker 3 violence is never the answer.

Speaker 3 But it's not hard to,

Speaker 3 again, because it's all imagination and sort of like emotional play and make-believe.

Speaker 3 As dark as it may be, it is make-believe in the end, so it is easy, very easy for me to imagine

Speaker 3 taking somebody out if they're coming for my own.

Speaker 5 So could you survive, Pedro, for real? Like in a real life, if this was like...

Speaker 3 I don't think so.

Speaker 3 I don't know. I think if the people that I love were sticking around and being like, you know, no, we got to deal with this.
And I'd be like, oh, shoot.

Speaker 3 Okay.

Speaker 3 All right, let's face this. Because I'd be too scared scared of leaving anybody behind and or leaving anybody on their own.
But I don't know. I'm definitely not down for stress.

Speaker 5 Right. I mean, because there's the constant fear of the people you love keeping them safe.

Speaker 3 Exactly. That's what keeps you going.
That's kind of what keeps you alive. With Joel, I think it's different because he feels he's lost all the people that he loves.

Speaker 3 And then he doesn't really let himself love anymore. He's looking for his brother at the beginning of the first season,

Speaker 3 his brother whom he loves very much.

Speaker 3 but outside of that, he's not allowing himself to love, so it really is simply

Speaker 3 survival.

Speaker 3 And I don't know if I would have that will.

Speaker 5 You hosted SNL in 2023, but we're still talking about it like it was just yesterday. It comes up often.

Speaker 5 You know, it's like a high point for many actors. What did it mean for you?

Speaker 3 Oh, everything.

Speaker 3 I have to say,

Speaker 3 I'm trying to lean away from being too hyperbolic about it, but it was definitely like the most romantic experience I've ever had. Romantic.
Professionally, yeah. What do you mean by that?

Speaker 3 Its legacy, you know, number one,

Speaker 3 what it has authored in terms of culture for better or worse, you know,

Speaker 3 since it started. And so it's just something I grew up with.

Speaker 3 Some Some of its original stars are

Speaker 3 my biggest imprints.

Speaker 3 I mean, Eddie Murphy came from SNL.

Speaker 5 I know, right? Do you, I'm thinking about...

Speaker 3 SNL gave us Eddie Murphy. Right.

Speaker 5 Were you thinking about that during your time on there?

Speaker 3 I was thinking about all of that.

Speaker 3 And then I think that what I was expecting was all of that to really kind of make it a miserable experience because I would be so afraid and so in my head about bombing on live TV and

Speaker 3 really like marking a point in my life with public humiliation.

Speaker 5 There's so much to hold.

Speaker 3 I know, I know.

Speaker 3 I know, I know. But let's just say, you know, you hold it, but you start to let it go.

Speaker 5 Was there a moment on the set where you were like, oh, I'm doing fine?

Speaker 3 There is a process that is so, it's so ritual.

Speaker 3 And we have such an incredible community of actors, you know, that have gone through the experience and so many of which that were so willing to kind of talk to me before I went into it because, you know, it's something you feel you can't say no to,

Speaker 3 but also with the offer is terror before excitement,

Speaker 3 which has been, which is the case for many people that I've spoken to.

Speaker 5 Did you call us

Speaker 5 or did people call you up when they found out you were going to be on there?

Speaker 3 For the first couple of weeks, I didn't talk to anybody because I wasn't willing to think about it beyond my capacity of facing the reality that it it was going to happen and then once there was an announcement and and it was out there then I started to I talked to friends that had been on it but right before I got into like my first sort of like Monday night meeting with with the cast and the writers and Lauren Michaels I was talking to Aubrey Plaza who had just hosted and had slayed

Speaker 3 And she took me through this process and she was just like, just go with it. Monday's this.
Tuesday's that. Wednesday starts to ramp up and it starts to turn into this.

Speaker 3 And then Thursday, like, you know, like, save yourself. You're gonna have the Wednesday night dinner, don't get too drunk.

Speaker 3 Because on Thursday is when it really is, you know.

Speaker 5 Because that dinner is when it's the whole cast, guys.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah. And you have a dinner, and it's like, it's all a ritual that has been fine-tuned or very much in place from its very beginning.
But it definitely feels like you are in this like

Speaker 3 decades-long experience that holds you

Speaker 3 very, very well. And on Monday, the first thing was going in and having a one-on-one with Lorne

Speaker 3 in his office and sitting across from this legendary person in the intimacy of just the two of you having, I don't know what we were going to talk about. Well, you know, I just, I just, I didn't care.

Speaker 3 I was just like, I'm just going to sit there and I'm going to listen. Or, you know, I hope he doesn't, I hope I'm not meant to contribute anything because all I have right now is fear.

Speaker 3 And to my left is this fish tank with these

Speaker 3 big-eyed, blinking, smiling, kind of bulbous-lipped fish that are kind of like curiously swimming up to the glass to check out the stranger in the office.

Speaker 3 And it's just giving you this sweet, dumb smile and blinking at you. And it was so disarming.
I have no idea if it is intentional on his part, but

Speaker 3 it was, oh my God, did it work. And then

Speaker 3 he

Speaker 3 is somebody that really

Speaker 3 wants to set you up for success. And

Speaker 3 I felt very seen. And then comes the community of actors and writers that are all fully enthusiastic and passionate about

Speaker 3 what they do and get really excited if you're down to do do whatever

Speaker 5 whatever they want.

Speaker 3 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 3 Heck yeah.

Speaker 5 You were down. So my producers and I had a debate really about what clip to play because they were all so funny.
But I want to play a clip from a skit you did called Fan Cam Assembly.

Speaker 5 So you play Mr. Ben.
He's a popular high school teacher.

Speaker 5 He's leading this assembly with all these students in an auditorium about the tech rules of the school, specifically begging kids to stop making fan cams of you, Mr. Ben.

Speaker 5 And just to let the audience know, since they can't see it, like these fan cam videos, you're like,

Speaker 5 I mean, you know, they're edits. They're like, you're hot, like you're looking at the camera smoldering, you know, like you're all of this.

Speaker 5 And the students push back when you say, like, don't do this anymore. They push back with stand slang and they keep cutting together new fan cams of you in real time.
Let's listen.

Speaker 3 No, skinny legend. why are you doing this?

Speaker 3 Because you have made thousands of fan cams of me and I'm not sure what they mean, but I know it has to stop. But we make them because you're our beloved and you have us in a chalk hall.

Speaker 3 Okay, don't say that.

Speaker 3 I just don't understand. Why do you make sparkly fast romantic montages of me every single day? Like this?

Speaker 7 I mean, we don't make them every day.

Speaker 3 Yeah, just on the days you send us or give us life.

Speaker 3 But what does that mean?

Speaker 5 Don't worry, it just means your foot is always on our necks.

Speaker 3 Is that me right now?

Speaker 3 How did you make that so fast? And how did you take over access to the monitor? Mr. Ben, why are you so mad? You're in your assembly era.

Speaker 3 I'm not mad. I'm confused.

Speaker 3 Is the way I ate this up a compliment because it was nom-nom-delish and had you gagged? Exactly.

Speaker 8 We love you down, Mr. Ben.

Speaker 8 You're so father, period.

Speaker 5 That was my guest today, Pedro Pascal on SNL from 2023.

Speaker 5 Have you ever had a surreal moment where you're like, oh my gosh, wow, I am a meme. I am a certified meme, and people are making edits of me every day, hundreds of them, on TikTok and Instagram.

Speaker 3 I love the young generation so much. I'm just listening to that and all of the phrasing.

Speaker 3 I just die for it. I really do.
And

Speaker 3 I came to it kind of late. You know, just like everybody, I don't know what year we're talking about, but at some point, you know, I had Facebook and

Speaker 3 then came

Speaker 3 Instagram. TikTok I didn't have.

Speaker 3 I think, yes, at one point it found its way like into

Speaker 3 my algorithm.

Speaker 5 But I think it's like you found your way into your algorithm.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to call it it.

Speaker 3 I'm going to call that. it found its way into my algorithm because um you know which are also kind of you know brilliant hilarious edits to songs and

Speaker 3 I definitely am

Speaker 3 flattered

Speaker 3 totally perplexed by a lot of it because

Speaker 3 I don't know I mean how would you feel you know what I mean like you just have to kind of just sort of go all right right right right just let it be just kind of like because it authors itself on its own really and so there's a strange relationship you feel you don't have to a thing that's kind of happening

Speaker 4 our guest today is actor pedro pascal we'll be right back after a short break i'm tanya mosley and this is fresh air support for this podcast and the following message come from built where you can earn points on your monthly rent payment but did you know they make it possible for you to get more outside of your home too by paying rent through built you earn flexible points that can be redeemed toward hundreds of hotels and airlines a future rent payment, your next lift ride, and more.

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Speaker 5 You moved to New York for college and you got deep into the theater. You had these small roles on television, Law and Order, some other little bits.

Speaker 3 All of them.

Speaker 5 All of them. Right.

Speaker 5 But your breakthrough role did did not happen until 2014 with Game of Thrones.

Speaker 5 And I want to go back to that time period because I think you talked about like it was 15 years of entry level for you, which a lot of those years were in the theater.

Speaker 5 That's 15 years of climbing, of near success.

Speaker 5 Because what had been success for you up until that moment?

Speaker 3 Success up to that moment, which was huge, because I tell you, when you get a call and they say you booked a part, whether it's like, you know, two scenes in an episode of Law and Order, you know, you jump up and down.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 it always felt that way. And as I got older, I think that there was incredible success in just supporting myself

Speaker 3 through acting.

Speaker 5 And

Speaker 5 you were doing this through theater.

Speaker 3 Through theater and episodic television. Yep, yep.
Yeah. And the medical insurance through equity, which was

Speaker 3 our stage actors union,

Speaker 3 was really good.

Speaker 3 I don't know how good it is now. Yeah.
But it was that these kinds of things really, really help you survive.

Speaker 3 And even though you're, you know, barely, like what you're actually putting into the bank is

Speaker 3 barely enough to, well, it's not nearly enough to pay your rent, but there are a lot of elements in place with consistent work that just kind of help you get by.

Speaker 5 Trevor Burrus, Jr.: What were some of the things you were doing in those in-between times, between roles, between theater roles, and this episodic television appearance?

Speaker 3 I was working in restaurants. Yeah.
And I was never good at it because that's a real skill. You know, service is highly, highly demanding work and highly

Speaker 3 laborious. And I mean, a lot of it can be anyway.
Some busy restaurants. I mean, that is some high octane.

Speaker 5 Is it true that you got fired like 10 times? Oh, yeah.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 From different restaurants.

Speaker 3 Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Different cafes that were opening up from like I got fired from being a barista.
What were the

Speaker 3 number one reason?

Speaker 5 That's a lot of firings, Pedro.

Speaker 3 I know. I know.
You know, there would be a lot of different reasons. I will, I'd be lying if I didn't say that sometimes it was attitude.

Speaker 3 Yeah. I'm not perfect.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 yeah.

Speaker 3 Some one one manager didn't like my attitude or one customer didn't like my attitude or I just wasn't very, honestly, I wasn't very good at it.

Speaker 3 I didn't get good at it until it took it took years to get good at it and to be sort of consistently in one place. There was a

Speaker 3 I can't believe I'm talking about this, but there was

Speaker 3 a restaurant manager named Alyssa and it's funny we can turn this into kind of the theme of of feeling and being seen and kind of believed in. You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 I had that at a restaurant and she kind of, you know, she sort of stuck it out with me and she she really really kind of helped me learn instead of through kind of pressure and antagonism but support how to how to wait tables well and she was just kind of like on your side as a restaurant manager and and I felt that to be kind of like a rare

Speaker 3 and

Speaker 3 very refreshing kind of energy.

Speaker 5 What was it about acting? Because

Speaker 5 you started talking about wanting to be an actor at like four years old.

Speaker 3 Well, I was born in 75.

Speaker 3 And just think about seeing E.T.

Speaker 3 in the movie theater. You know, think about seeing poltergeist and the goonies and, you know, gremlins.
And, you know, so I was

Speaker 3 very, very easy source of building a fantasy of

Speaker 3 you know, wishing you were either living these adventures, experiencing these adventures, or

Speaker 3 part of the adventure of telling those stories. Yeah.
You know?

Speaker 5 I keep coming across these little details like you being obsessed with the color purple.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 5 James Baldwin for color girls, to kill a mockingbird. So you were really into literature as well.
And I'm trying to piece together who is this kid? How would you describe yourself back then?

Speaker 5 You were a deeply feeling child, but what did these worlds provide for you?

Speaker 5 Because, you know, they're entertaining for everyone else, but it sounds like there was another step for you where you felt immersed in them.

Speaker 3 Well, I think being moved

Speaker 3 you feel very alive. You feel very inspired you know and in school in a way by

Speaker 3 incredible storytelling, incredible performances, incredible literature, you know.

Speaker 3 So the process around the color purple is very interesting because we had cable TV and Whoopi Goldberg Goldberg had a televised show that had been transferred to Broadway and then shot for television for HBO.

Speaker 3 It was just called Whoopi. Yes.
And

Speaker 3 she was playing a bunch of different characters and

Speaker 3 I was just floored.

Speaker 3 It was magic.

Speaker 3 And with that show, Whoopee, I mean, I saw that so many times. I could do some of her models.
I was like,

Speaker 3 the hair and the towel. Oh, my gosh.
And he said, okay, I said, okay. We said, okay, okay.

Speaker 3 And I mean, I literally haven't, I haven't seen that since, I think, the 80s. Yeah.
You know, and it's imprinted, right?

Speaker 3 And then

Speaker 3 I'm walking out of a movie and I see a poster of this like silhouette of Whoopi Goldberg in a rocking chair with purple and Steven Spielberg's name on it.

Speaker 3 And her name, Whoopi Goldberg, in the color purple. And I'm just like,

Speaker 3 here I am completely moved by the marketing of it.

Speaker 3 And I think the movie is a masterpiece. And I think it's one of the greatest screen performances in the history of cinema that she did in her

Speaker 3 purely freshman experience, her first time on camera, on film, her first movie role.

Speaker 3 And I just was frankly overwhelmed by it in the best way. And I couldn't let it go.
So I had to get the book. And I read the book.
You'd walk around with the book? I would hold it, yeah.

Speaker 3 I would hold it like a like a like a treasure.

Speaker 5 Your mom saw this in you.

Speaker 5 She saw this and wanted to connect with you because of it. You guys would have these family movie nights.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 My dad was my dad

Speaker 3 was the movie goer. My mom was selective.

Speaker 3 She would fall for,

Speaker 3 she would notice much more if I was like really into a book

Speaker 3 or if Prince was in it.

Speaker 5 So you were a big Prince Prince fan. But that also.

Speaker 3 No, she was the Prince fan. Okay.
She was the huge Prince fan, which by proxy made me a big Prince fan.

Speaker 5 And that's around Purple Rain time.

Speaker 3 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 5 Let's take a short break. If you're just joining us, my guest is Pedro Pascal.
We'll continue our conversation after a short break. This is Fresh air.

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Speaker 5 What were these movie nights like, these family movie nights?

Speaker 3 Well, Purple Rain is a perfect example of where we all went together.

Speaker 3 Like my dad would try to, you know, take us on a school night whenever he got a chance to whatever he wanted to see, but Purple Rain was like, we're all going, you know.

Speaker 3 And I guess they're sort of, you know, my most special memories. We're a very sort of like movie-going family.
My older sister has a love of dance

Speaker 3 and did ballet. So we would go to the, as a child, she studied ballet.
And so we would go to the ballet a lot. I hated it at first until I saw I think

Speaker 3 a really hilarious

Speaker 3 production of a Midsummer Night's Dream and then started to kind of

Speaker 3 really appreciate the kind of storytelling that happened through dance.

Speaker 5 Did you ever dance?

Speaker 3 I didn't. I didn't dance.
I mean I danced you know like at any chance I got.

Speaker 5 Yeah, to prints and stuff.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I danced around the house.

Speaker 3 I danced around my parents' parties, Christmas, New Year's,

Speaker 3 all that stuff.

Speaker 3 I never took class, but then in a performing arts program that my mother found that I went to from my freshman year in high school to graduation, you had to study dance, you know, did West Side Story and I love dance and actually got sort of really seriously into, I guess what you would call sort of post-modern style of improvisational dance in college.

Speaker 3 And that was the only work I could get when I graduated, actually, were through movement professors and doing

Speaker 3 a lot of downtown stuff.

Speaker 5 When you say downtown, what do you mean?

Speaker 3 South of 14th Street, St. Mark's Church, Lower East Side, East Village, site-specific performances, this piece called

Speaker 3 Demeter's Daughter that was conceived by a choreographer named Tamar Rogoff,

Speaker 3 who is a lifelong family friend and mentor to Claire Danes.

Speaker 5 What kinds of stuff would you do for them? Yeah.

Speaker 3 Like postmodern dance, like, you know, sort of create movement and dance. And then it wasn't the kind of thing like,

Speaker 3 this is the choreography, learn it. It was like, let's move and let's write this together.

Speaker 5 Kind of like improvisation, but for the body.

Speaker 3 For body movement.

Speaker 5 I'm so fascinated about that physicality because there is a holding of the body in all the characters that you play.

Speaker 5 I'm thinking about in The Last of Us, Like, how would you describe what Joel is holding in his body?

Speaker 3 Yeah,

Speaker 3 holding

Speaker 3 a lot of trauma, one.

Speaker 3 And then

Speaker 3 in a more simple way,

Speaker 3 this is a man who works with his hands.

Speaker 3 He's a contractor and he builds things.

Speaker 3 He, I think, expresses himself

Speaker 3 through his physical relationship to work

Speaker 3 and to maintenance and that kind of thing. So it's sort of like understanding a person who

Speaker 3 works very roughly with his hands and is in sort of a very consistent relationship to physical labor,

Speaker 3 you know,

Speaker 3 in a way that that he probably loves because it's way easier than having a conversation.

Speaker 3 Right, right.

Speaker 5 But it's so fascinating about you and your history with dancing because, I mean, so much of, well, so much of your acting is so physical. Like, I'm just thinking about a lot of films that you're in.

Speaker 5 There's so much silent power in what you're doing, but it's through your body that you're telling the story.

Speaker 3 Well,

Speaker 3 Game of Thrones being a perfect example of like experiencing, you know, that level of exposure for a part.

Speaker 3 And one would argue that what the role is most known for is the fight.

Speaker 5 Yes.

Speaker 3 And that is more dance than you can possibly believe.

Speaker 3 If you don't want to get killed anyway, you know,

Speaker 3 that is physicality in its purest form. And that is choreography in its purest form.

Speaker 3 So it's just ironic because I was already pushing 40 when that job happened. And so the doors that opened were,

Speaker 3 frankly, leaning in the world of action and a lot of highly, highly, highly physical choreography in the experiences, more so than I could have ever imagined.

Speaker 3 Having had a lot of like fight choreography on stage, you know,

Speaker 3 in Shakespeare and all that. But this was like another level.

Speaker 5 Your family history is fascinating because your parents fled Chile when you were a baby. Growing up, what was the story that you heard?

Speaker 3 You know, I didn't hear any stories about it, actually.

Speaker 3 And I hear stories now because I ask.

Speaker 3 And I also am met with the sort of desire to share and desire to tell what it meant for, you know,

Speaker 3 my father's sisters to say goodbye to their brother

Speaker 3 in in that way.

Speaker 3 For my mother's family to live in the terror of the experience of her going into hiding.

Speaker 5 Because what's the story? Because the story that you came to learn, your parents were very young. You were a baby and they fled from South America to the United States, to Texas.

Speaker 3 Yes, we had asylum in Denmark first

Speaker 3 and were likely to, you know, stay there were it not for somebody that helped hire my father into his lab in San Antonio, Texas.

Speaker 5 Why were your parents exiled?

Speaker 3 Oh, well, they were involved in the opposition movement against the military regime under Pinochet.

Speaker 3 They were Allende supporters and frankly, just very young and liberal.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 my mother's side of the family, there's a cousin of my mother's, Andrés Pascal, who was a leader of the opposition movement.

Speaker 3 And so that, I think, just by association, sort of could put the name and family in peril.

Speaker 3 But there was

Speaker 3 someone who brought an injured man to my mother's and father's home, knowing that my father was doing his residency at a hospital and asked for help.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 he'd been shot in the leg.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 it was a priest who brought him over to

Speaker 3 our house. And,

Speaker 3 And at this point, I'm an infant, so obviously I have no memory.

Speaker 3 But

Speaker 3 the priest was taken into custody, and he was tortured, and he gave names.

Speaker 3 And then they went looking for my parents.

Speaker 3 And so they had to

Speaker 3 go into hiding and

Speaker 3 find a way to survive.

Speaker 3 There are a lot of details that kind of go into it, that create such a fascinating story,

Speaker 3 the odd circumstance of my father finding out that someone was in the lobby asking for his name and

Speaker 3 a patient that kind of like interrupted the moment where the officer wanted to

Speaker 3 was about to ask my father who he was or his name, if he was in fact Dr. Balmaseda.

Speaker 3 and a patient that was like, you know, I'm in pain and no one is attending to me. And And

Speaker 3 I almost wonder, I mean, you know, you got to be careful because, you know, how much story do you build around it and what's really real.

Speaker 3 But this was this chance circumstance that gave my father the opportunity to sneak out the back to go and get my mother and

Speaker 3 go into hiding. And they were right because they came to the house,

Speaker 3 they tore everything apart. And it was about six months before they found a plan to sneak sneak into the Venezuelan embassy and claim asylum and be reunited with my sister and I.

Speaker 5 What a story to learn in adulthood. It's not a lore.
It's not a story you grew up knowing and having pride in. Right.

Speaker 3 I had a sense of it. I remember one very, very vivid experience of seeing the movie missing.

Speaker 3 See, this is the funny thing, is that like, here we are, this nuclear family in the suburbs of San Antonio, Texas, with this

Speaker 3 not distant legacy of

Speaker 3 escape. I mean, the dictatorship was continuing on, and I'm seeing a movie about it in my house, and Sissy Space is the size of my mother.
Right, because the age of my mother

Speaker 3 and the movie Missing, right, by Costa Gravas. Yes.

Speaker 3 And her,

Speaker 3 you know, being out in the streets. past curfew by accident and her life being in peril and and me somehow putting all of that together and understanding understanding that

Speaker 3 sort of placing my mother in that circumstance as a child and just like absolutely falling apart. How old were you?

Speaker 3 When the movie came out in, I must have been like, I don't know, maybe seven. Wow.

Speaker 3 Yeah. It was a different time.
Parents were letting us,

Speaker 3 parents were letting us watch whatever was on TV.

Speaker 5 But I'm saying wow about you piecing that together and somehow understanding Sissy Sube Sek is my mom.

Speaker 3 Yeah, feeling that way. Feeling that way.
Feeling Feeling that way in that moment. And it had to stop.

Speaker 3 I fell apart.

Speaker 5 You literally started crying. Oh,

Speaker 3 I started,

Speaker 3 I mean, it was like, you know, I think

Speaker 3 something, you know, bordering on howling.

Speaker 3 I was so

Speaker 3 traumatized by the idea.

Speaker 3 I don't know. I never got a chance to talk to my mom about it the way I'm talking to you about it.
You know,

Speaker 3 Unfortunately, I wonder if she understood.

Speaker 3 But

Speaker 3 yeah, I guess just to answer it simply, no, not really.

Speaker 5 When you say you wonder if she understood, what do you mean?

Speaker 3 If she understood that I was kind of

Speaker 3 a son who was scared for her, you know,

Speaker 3 and kind of

Speaker 3 absorbing the context, but not really knowing how to process the context.

Speaker 5 If you're just joining us, my guest is Pedro Pascal. We'll continue our conversation after a short break.
This is Fresh Air.

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Speaker 5 Movies have been so important to you and

Speaker 3 everything.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 5 They allow you to understand the world.

Speaker 3 Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.

Speaker 5 And now you're doing that for other people. Do you ever think about it like that?

Speaker 3 I feel profound gratitude to be doing something that I love to do and the people that I get to do it with

Speaker 3 and being sort of always a part of an experience, you know, whether it's well received or not.

Speaker 3 But always like everyone involved is putting their entire selves and bodies into, you know, and

Speaker 3 cares so much about making it. And it's very bonding, it's very fun.
And I don't know anything else.

Speaker 5 That SNL appearance, it also happened on the anniversary of your mother's death.

Speaker 5 Yeah.

Speaker 5 Did you clock that for yourself?

Speaker 3 I really did.

Speaker 3 It was obviously a sad anniversary for most of

Speaker 3 my adult life and for my, you know,

Speaker 3 my family's life, my siblings, you know, their whole lives.

Speaker 3 And I don't think I realized it until there was kind of like a post-it note announcement in the way that SNL does, where they have the date, the host, and the musical guest.

Speaker 3 And I realized that

Speaker 3 I hadn't seen that.

Speaker 3 I hadn't seen those numbers together outside of

Speaker 3 my mother's gravestone. I was like, oh my gosh, wow.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 of course there was so much opportunity there to sort of add fear to the experience in a profound way. This is going to be a double negative anniversary.

Speaker 3 And it was the opposite. And my family was there and it was a day of like achievement and

Speaker 3 joy,

Speaker 3 incredible joy and

Speaker 3 community.

Speaker 3 Because the other magical part of SNL is that it really actually felt like old days in the theater, like showing up and doing a reading of somebody's play or like mounting something on the fly, you know.

Speaker 3 And were it not for all of those years, I think in New York, I think I cognitively could have easily had a total meltdown because of how you are needing to read cue cards and be in the moment.

Speaker 3 So that it would be, you know, on February 4th was a gift that I'm holding on to.

Speaker 5 What a gift. Yeah.

Speaker 5 Oh, Pedro, this has been great.

Speaker 3 Thank you, Tanya. Thank you so much for having me.
I can't tell you, this is part of my little pinch-me moment.

Speaker 3 I told you before we started, I've been listening to NPR through my parents since I was a teenager in my entire adult life. I've been listening to Fresh Air forever.

Speaker 3 And getting to sit here with you is

Speaker 3 very special.

Speaker 5 Pedro Pascal, he's nominated for an Emmy Award for his performance in season two of The Last of Us.

Speaker 5 His film Fantastic Four First Steps is still in theaters, and Eddington and the Materialists are now streaming.

Speaker 5 Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Phyllis Myers, Roberta Shorak, Anne-Marie Baldonado, Lauren Krinzel, Teresa Madden, Monique Nazareth, Susan Yakundi, Anna Valman, and John Sheehan.

Speaker 5 Our digital media producer is Molly C. V.
Nesper. Our consulting visual producer is Hope Wilson.

Speaker 5 Chaloner directed today's show. With Terry Gross, I'm Tanya Mosley.

Speaker 8 This message comes from Vital Farms, who works with small American farms to bring you pasture-raised eggs. Farmer Tanner Pace describes what makes a pasture-raised egg unique.

Speaker 10 Before we first started with Vital Farms, I thought, you know, an egg's an egg, not a big deal, but it's hard for me to even eat an eggs that's not a vital farm egg.

Speaker 10 Now, Vital Farms eggs are usually brown to lighter brown in color. And when you crack a pasteurized egg,

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Speaker 10 And basically when that egg cracks in the skillet or bowl, that yolk is almost kind of an orange shade.

Speaker 10 And that is part of what I love about a vital egg is just the shade of yolk. I love pasteurized eggs because you can see the work and the pride that the farmers have and have put into these eggs.

Speaker 8 To learn more about how Vital Farms farmers care for their hens, visit vitalfarms.com.

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