Pedro Pascal opens up about the tragic details behind his mother's death and how it impacted his life
Warning: This article contains discussion of suicide which some readers may find distressing.
Pedro Pascal made some heartbreaking remarks about his mother's death.
Pascal is now on the top of most director and producers' casting lists having found success in The Mandalorian, The Last of Us, Narcos, Game of Thrones, and Gladiator II.
But it's not always been easy for the 50-year-old, who came from very humble beginnings.
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Pascal was born to Veronica Pascal and José Balmaceda in Santiago, Chile, who were still college students when they welcomed him and his sister Javiera into the world.
Pascal's parents went on to seek asylum and fled General Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship when he was just nine months old. They first moved to Denmark before making their way over to the States.
He later paid tribute to his mom and dad in his 2023 Saturday Night Live monologue, saying: "My parents fled and brought me and my sister to the US. They were so brave and without them I wouldn’t be here in this wonderful country and I certainly wouldn’t be standing [on the SNL stage] tonight."
While the family carved out a new life from themselves, things took a tragic turn when Pascal's mother took her own life in 2000 when he was 24.
His parents returned to Chile in 1995, where they raised Pascal's two younger siblings. He rushed home to Santiago to attended services that were put on for his mother after her death.
Around the time, Pascal had pinned his hopes on landing a role in Dark Angel; something he believed to be a big deal before his mother's untimely death. But he didn't land the role.
Recalling how he felt at the time, he told Vanity Fair: "You think not getting a job can break me? You can’t break me, I’m already broken."
He found that Los Angeles, where he was living at the time, had 'no place' for his grief, so he moved back to New York City where he'd once attended at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts.
Fast forward to February 2023 and Pascal hosted his first ever SNL on the anniversary of his mom's passing. Following the success of the episode, Pascal and his pals, including American Horror Story's Sarah Paulson, partied 'until the sun came up'.
Paulson described the huge moment in Pascal's career and it being the anniversary of his mother's death being like a 'rebirth'.
"It was just a night we didn’t want to end," she told Vanity Fair. "If there had been a camera on me when it was happening—and there’d been a slow push in—it would’ve shown me watching his life begin.
"Because he was so, so present, and having this wild time. And he had no idea that it was going so well, and with the timing of his mother and this moment in his career, it was like a rebirth."
Pascal went on to add: "I just felt like my mother was there. And—and I don’t know what else to say. It was a complete transformation of an anniversary."
His mother's death also impacted his birthdays after his 25th birthday came shortly after her suicide.
Over the years that followed, The Last of Us star seldom celebrated his birthdays, until he hit 50 this year when he hosted a multi-day celebration with his nearest and dearest.
If you or someone you know needs mental health assistance right now, call National Suicide Prevention Helpline on 1-800-273-TALK (8255). The Helpline is a free, confidential crisis hotline that is available to everyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Topics: Pedro Pascal, Mental Health, Parenting, Celebrity, News
Niamh Shackleton