If you don’t have a bit of a crush on Pedro Pascal, then there’s either something very wrong with you or you’ve been living under a rock.
There’s his wholesome dad vibes in The Last of Us, the silent protector in The Mandalorian, and how could we forget his sultry performance in Game of Thrones?
For real, though, Pascal has got a little something to get everyone going. Wait, do I have daddy issues?
Anyway, stick around to learn all about why Pedro Pascal is the internet’s favorite dad, and the surprisingly difficult time he had getting his first major roles!
José Pedro Balmaceda Pascal was born 50 years ago to a child psychologist and a fertility doctor on April 2, 1975, in Santiago, Chile. His star sign is Aries, in case you were wondering about compatibility.
He has two sisters, Javiera and Lux, and a younger brother named Nicolás. Both Lux and Nicolás are a lot younger than Pedro (17 and 12 years, respectively).
Pedro Pascal’s father, Jose, comes from the aristocracy, while his mother, Verónica, is the cousin of Andrés Pascal Allende, a militant left-wing revolutionary (and nephew of Chilean Socialist president Salvador Allende).
Pascal’s parents fled Chile when he was nine months old after being labeled enemies of the state by the new military dictator, Augusto Pinochet.
Pedro and his family eventually settled in the US, where they spent time in Texas before relocating to Orange County, California.
Pedro Pascal has 34 cousins, and no, we’re not going to list them all by name.
He studied acting in California at the Orange County School of the Arts before moving to NY in 1993 to go to New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.
One of Pascal’s closest friends is Sarah Paulson (of American Horror Story fame), who he met when he first moved to New York. He was constantly broke, and Sarah often gave him her acting money so he could feed himself.
After graduating, he got a couple of good gigs on shows like MTV’s Undressed and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and things looked promising for the young actor.
Pedro’s mother died suddenly in 2000, and it took many years for him to find his feet again. In honor of her, he took on her surname, Pascal. It was a lot easier for Americans to pronounce than Balmaceda, too.
Despite his talent, it was difficult for Pascal to find serious roles for a long time. One reason was his background, as he was often put in roles as a generic Latino gangster.
Pascal’s first feature film debut was in Julia Solomonoff’s Hermanas (“Sisters”), in which Solomonoff chose him for his photogenic, special, and mysterious face.
He almost had a big break in 2011 with a Wonder Woman TV show, in which he played Ed Indelicato in the pilot episode, but the show was never picked up.
Pedro Pascal’s rise to stardom finally started at the age of 39, when he played the handsome and intense Oberyn Martell in Season 4 of Game of Thrones.
Sarah Paulson helped Pascal gain the Game of Thrones gig by passing on his “amateurish” yet “intense and believable” iPhone selfie audition to the showrunner.
Things picked up real fast for Pascal in 2015, playing Max in Bloodsucking Bastards, and starring in a music video with Heidi Klum to promote her new lingerie line.
2015 also saw Pascal’s fame rise to new heights when he played Javier Peña in Narcos, eventually becoming the lead actor and narrator by the final season
Pascal’s first role as an initially serious and grumpy man who softens after meeting a child wasn’t with Baby Yoda in The Mandalorian, but in Prospect as Ezra, where he played a less-honorable version of Mando.
One of the roles that excited Pascal the most was in Wonder Woman 1984. Firstly, it was one of his earliest gigs that he was headhunted for, but also because it really challenged him as an actor to play the larger-than-life villain, Max Lord.
Outside of his work as an actor, Pedro Pascal is just an overwhelmingly wholesome guy who supported his sister Lux’s transition and is regularly seen supporting her on and off the red carpet.
It’s hard to pinpoint it exactly, but it was probably Pascal’s role as Joel in The Last of Us that cemented the Internet’s idea of him as the their favorite benevolent daddy. He’s cool, he’s adorable, he’s never gonna give you up, nor let you down.
He also called J. K. Rowling, a vocal funder and campaigner against trans rights, a “heinous loser” in April 2025 on Instagram for her celebration of a legal ruling that allowed the exclusion of trans women from women-only services.
Pascal’s advocacy extends to humanitarian issues, adding his name to a letter condemning both the entire film industry and Israel that stated, “we cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza.”
In 2024, Pedro Pascal was polled as Grindr’s hottest man of the year, but that should come as no surprise at this point.
And as a final little tidbit for you for reading this far, Pascal worked as a silver-haired go-go dancer at Madrid’s Morrocco nightclub back in 1996.
While these days Pedro Pascal is known as the Internet’s daddy, there are so many more layers to this wonderful human.
Yeah, he’s also a brilliant actor, but as you can see, it’s way more than that! He’s a humanitarian, he’s a loving and caring brother, and he’s worked incredibly hard to get where he is.
He’s simply a lovable goofball, and if you don’t see it, go and watch Nicolas Cage’s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.
