Fresh Air - Best Of: Jude Law / Pedro Pascal

Episode Date: September 20, 2025

Jude Law now stars in the thriller series Black Rabbit on Netflix. He spoke with Tonya Mosley about the show, working with a dialect coach, and why he worked with a perfumer to play Henry VIII.  Rock critic Ken Tucker shares some of his favorite music releases of the fall, and Pedro Pascal talks about how his dance training helped him become a better actor in action roles. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This message comes from 48 hours. The seemingly random murders of a beloved couple left the town of Davis, California, paralyzed in fear. Join correspondent Aaron Moriarty for 15 inside the Daniel Marsh murders, available wherever you get your podcasts. From W.HYY in Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. Today, actor Jude Law. He talks about the range of characters he's brought to life throughout his. his career, and how he hopes people see more to him than his good looks. But just the other day, I was at the Toronto Film Festival, and in at least two or three of

the interviews, that's all they wanted to talk about, my looks. And I got to look to them and thought, you know, I'm a 52-year-old guy. I've got a 30-year career, and that's all you're talking about. Also, we hear from Pedro Pascal. He's been a Marvel superhero, a grieving smuggler in The Last of Us, and a bounty hunter in the Mandalorian. This summer, we hear from him. This summer, where he starred in the Fantastic Four First Steps, Eddington, and The Materialists. And rock critic Kent Tucker shares some of his favorite music releases this fall. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. This message comes from NPR sponsor, SAP Concur.

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T's and Cs apply. This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. And my first guest today is award-winning actor Jude Law. In his new Netflix series Black Rabbit, he plays the owner of one of New York's most exclusive restaurants, a man who is magnetic and successful, but also deeply compromised. His judgment clouded, his loyalties divided. His name is Jake Friedkin. And when his estranged brother, played by Jason Bateman, returns with dangerous debts, the world he's built begins. to fall apart. Here's how we first meet Jake, describing his restaurant with a tense foreshadowing of what's to come. I want to say something quick. For those of you

don't know who I am, get the fuck out. No, I'm Jake. Yeah, yeah. I own the place. All right, all right. Wow. This is the kind of party Black Rabbit

is built for. When we set out to create this place, we never wanted it to be just a restaurant. We wanted to build a home for our family, our friends, our people. A place you could come for a drink, a smoke, for the best burger in New York. Rocks. Yeah. A place where the night, he's a place where the night could go anyway. Law isn't only the lead. He's also an executive producer, shaping the series' vision of New York City's nightlife, a world that's as glamorous as it is treacherous.

Over the last three decades, Law has moved fluidly between independent films, Hollywood blockbusters, and stage work. in London and New York. He's been nominated for two Academy Awards and is known for roles that walk the line between charm and danger, from Dickie Greenleaf and the talented Mr. Ripley to Closer, Cold Mountain, and the Sherlock Holmes films,

as well as the Fantastic Beast series. Jude Law, welcome to fresh air. So let's talk a little bit about your character, Jake, and his brother, played by Jason Bateman. This is not a cane and able type story. This is not good versus evil. Both of you all are pretty messed up. How would you describe your character, Jake?

Well, the brothers and their relationship sit in the foreground of a piece that's also about a particular slice of New York life. And I hope, sort of any city's life, it's about pulling together a team and providing together a team and providing. providing a kind of hot spot for, you know, the movers and the shakers and all the dynamics that go on behind the scenes of that kind of establishment, the complexities, the relationships, the pressures. And the brothers who had built this place, this venue, are kind of reflections of all the complexities. And one of them, my character, Jake, is the sort of front man.

the veneer, you know, with a smile and a shoe shine. And for all accounts seems to be very successful, very smooth, a great person at juggling issue, problem, people management. And Vince, played by Jason, is more of the sort of creative, anarchic idea guy, but not great at following through. And he's disappeared. He comes back and sort of shakes it all up. But what you realize is that actually there's a whole lot of issues going on behind the curtain, if you like, of Jake.

And Vince's arrival really just sort of pulls that curtain apart. You use the word veneer to describe your character, that he has like this perfect veneer. But that's just the surface because underneath, as you said, there's a lot of complexity. He's got a lot of challenges. I want to play a clip where he's talking to his brother. events, as we said, played by Jason Bateman. And he's talking about the truth with his finances. And in this clip, it all kind of comes together where we start to learn. It's not on the up and up inside of this restaurant. Let's listen. You bet Mom's money on the Knicks.

A lot of people bet the Knicks, Jake. They're a professional basketball team. And the money you got from the restaurant? Is the one you intervened kick me out of? Bailed you out. Bailed you out. Saved You gambled that too, right? Then you go down to junior, take a loan on the house, you bet it again, lost it all. And then you skip town. Sound right? Sounds like the least favorable way you could possibly phrase it,

but yeah, you're all caught up. And us, I gotta ask, because the suspense is killing me. What happened to your shoes, Vince? I got a sweet number on the bus. You sold your shoes. I took 500 bucks, and I'm chipping away at it. I'm doing my part, giggles.

Yeah. Okay? I did it on my way home from getting my finger chopped off by those damn zeros who say Jen is next. You're helping me. They said that. They said Jen is next. That's exactly what they said.

How much do you all them, Vince? 140. Big number. 140 grand? It's a big number. There was juice. Jesus. That's my guest, Jute Law,

in scene with Jason Bateman in the new Netflix series, Black Rabbit. I know that you're the executive producer on this, and you initially thought about Jason as a director. Yes. How did it come to be then he's your brother and he's that particular brother? I believe the order was.

because we were developing this piece. And when it became apparent that, you know, it was time to sort of go out, find the director who's going to bring and breathe life into it, we kept referencing Ozark and the tonality of Ozark, that sort of dark, human,

but humorous pitch that Jason also has as a performer. And he fortunately saw what we saw in the scripts and came on board as a director, wanted to throw himself behind it. And we hadn't found a brother for me. And it just became apparent to me. Well, he should, you know, he's such a great actor

and what a great asset. Do you want to be one of the brothers? And he has this incredible quality, I think, to be likable. And it seemed like if we could have a Vince that did all this bad, had all this, you know, track record. And we still kind of like him? But you still kind of forgive him.

Yeah. And he can still kind of be the funniest guy in the room and the most entertaining and charismatic. And, you know, yeah, fortunately he saw that. And so that's how we became the brothers. This fascinating world, New York nightlife, behind the kitchen, you know, getting to see all the dramas and things like that. And your character in particular, he's a New Yorker.

You're this New York archetype. You've even got a New York accent that kind of comes out. Did you study any particular person or accent or anything to kind of embody that? Yeah, Jake's a kind of amalgamation of a few people I know who had similar jobs. and the voice came from working with a coach and the trick I find that helps is to be very specific about an accent like you can't just say it's a sort of general New York

it's like okay where did he grow up and what did the parents sound like and obviously I had Jason as a brother so I also had to go towards what Jason sounds like and you have to give the acts in a kind of history otherwise you're generalizing and so you did that for this character in particular where you made a person out of this person

well you that's how I just like to do it you go back and where was he born and what was his childhood like and what was mom like what was dad like what was his friends like what was he listening to on the street you know what was his shows or is he watching and you kind of

track their emotional and their life up to where you are at and how they've dealt with the different bridges, the different dilemmas, the different dramas, the different dramas. And so you fill in this history so that, you know, if people talk in a scene about your mom, you have an immediate reaction because you know what happens at mom and how you feel about her. And it's the same with an accent, right? it's amazing that the little things that influence if I was to talk about my own accent so I have my mother was from the north of England so I have a very, a little bit of the northern England in my ars, my dad's from south of England

and I grew up in quite a, what would I call it? I don't know, there was quite a strong South East London accent which I kind of tried to hide because I wanted to sound more... Posh. Yeah. But it comes out, like, if I'm in, if I go home or if I'm with certain friends. Yeah.

So all of that's in my voice. Yes. And so if you're playing a character, you want all of those details to be there. I'm so fascinated by this work because you've had to play quite a few characters with different accents. I can imagine it's not an easy thing to hold on to all of that while also realizing, and that you have to embody this accent. When you practice it, it's kind of muscles, honestly, in the end. I mean, personally, I think I'm always doing an accent,

even when I'm playing someone who's English, because they have a different background, right? Right. It depends on what part. It just depends on what part of England. And what you, there's the thinking it through, and then there's the technique of doing it. And the technique is actually quite like taking your mouth and throat to the gym. You're basically teaching it to do different things.

So you have, you have, you have, drills to do, funny, like, sentences so that you're, you're teaching your tongue to go in a certain way. And then, and you listen a lot. Let's take a short break. If you're just joining us, my guest is actor Jude Law. He stars in the new Netflix series Black Rabbit, where he plays a nightclub owner entangled in crime, betrayal, and family ties. We'll continue our conversation after a short break. I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is Fresh Air Weekend. Support for this podcast comes from Dignity Memorial. For many families, remembering loved ones means honoring the details that made them unique.

Dignity Memorial is dedicated to professionalism and compassion in every detail of a life celebration. Find a provider near you at DignityMemorial.com. You come to the New Yorker Radio Hour for conversations that go deeper with people you really want to hear from, whether it's Bruce Springsteen or Questlove or Olivia Rodrigo, Liz Cheney, or the godfather of artificial intelligence, Jeffrey Hinton, or some of my extraordinarily well-informed colleagues at The New Yorker. So join us every week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, wherever you listen to podcasts. This message comes from 48 hours.

Want more 48 hours? Four days a week, the 48 hours podcast is bringing one of TV's most popular true crime series straight to your ears. Listen for original reporting and exclusive insights. Follow and listen wherever you get your podcasts. I am really fascinated by some of the things you've done to really embody a role. So I watched the other night Firebrand. Oh, yeah. Yeah, your 2023 film where you played King Henry the 8th. I read that you hired a perfumer. I work with her quite often, actually. Really? Yes. Yeah, she's, first of all, she's an absolute genius, Asie,

and she runs an amazing perfumery called The Perfumerie's Story. She makes incredible sense. And, you know, sense is a really quick way to accumulate sort of feelings and emotions. You know, if you walk into your grandma's house, it smells a certain way and you feel a certain way. If you go out and someone's been cutting the grass, right, it evokes all sorts of memories. and the smell of gasoline, you know. I mean, things like that are very pungent and very quick to make you feel and think and fit, you know.

And my job is an odd job. You know, whether you want to or not, you turn up, you put on someone else's clothes and you have to embody someone pretty damn quick. And sometimes it's like, hey, it's seven, the sun's coming up. We've got to go do this. Get in it. But let's talk about what she did for you. So she built this, she made a perfume for me.

And I'd read this piece about Henry. He basically had these ulcers on his leg that were rotting. and it was a miracle he lived the 10 years he did with them but you could smell him apparently three rooms away he stank like a feted yes and it was a really what I realized I'm playing him at the very end of his life when eventually he died of these things from a fever and I just thought it would be very helpful to everyone else and to me if I stank so she made me this incredible noxious

odour that I kind of sprayed on myself. It was made a concoction of pig sweat, fecal matter. You're going, does this say this? To mimic the smell of decaying fish, so it was really bad. It was really, really, really rancid, yeah. But it really helped it. To me, it was very interesting playing someone who is incredibly powerful, all dominant, expects everyone to bow to their every need and thought and want,

and yet is sitting in this, in a body that is immobile because of the weight he's put on and because of the wounds he has, kind of in his own rotting flesh and having to kind of face himself and he can't escape what he's done to himself and who he's become, you know, he's a mass murderer. and deluded to the extreme of believing that he's second only to God. Well, he's about to face God. And it's like, okay, what's going on? What's going on in that man?

You're pretty unrecognizable in that role. And I'm just wondering, there had to be some pretty interesting conversations around the rank smell on that set. It helped you. It also helped your colleagues, your co-stars. Well, I mean, it wasn't like I, you know, wanted to shock them or warn them, you know, but we discussed it. And Alicia Vikanda, who is, plays my wife in it, the queen, Queen Catherine Parr, was very game for it because she sort of loved this idea that she had to have this intimacy and this devotion amidst this sort of war. of stink, you know, and the guys who play my privy council were old friends of mine from

the theatre, and again, it was this sort of this conflict between observing their devotion and putting up with this appalling physical decay. Your parents were educators. What did they teach? My father started out teaching English, but then became quite a young age, a headmaster of a junior school. And my mom taught English.

She taught junior school too. And then she specialized in teaching English to foreign children who were coming in without the knowledge of the English language. And then she started. set up a theatre company. She was always very keen on theatre. So she stopped teaching, went and did a course in theatre directing and set up a theatre company.

And is that how you were introduced to... I was already... They were also very much involved in local theatres, a local amateur theatre. And that's really how I got involved. It was a place of great, yeah, community and fun. and I remember, you know, sitting in the back of the stalls of this little theatre when my mom and dad were putting on shows, doing my homework with my sister or sitting watching, you know, endless rehearsals. And it just became a place for me of, it was very familiar, it was safe, it was fun. You know, seeing adults playing and laughing, figuring stuff out, telling stories.

How do we do this in this way so that the people understand? And that was, what an education. I mean, that's, I grew up watching. that night after night. From the very start, you caught Hollywood's attention. Gattaca is one that I absolutely love and is a cult classic. At the time, it had done fairly well. But the talented Mr. Ripley, I think, is really when you became a name where folks could

identify you. Did it take you then by surprise just what they were paying attention to? Because it sounds like you wanted to have this serious career. Still do. Which you have done. But when you first arrived, it was really all about your looks. Yeah. Did that catch you by surprise?

Not really. I actually turned down the role in the talents of Mr. Ripley because my concern was he was the good-looking guy. And I was worried that that would. limit my career, I suppose. I wanted to be seen as something more than that. And I'm very lucky I didn't turn that roll down because it changed my career

and I got to work with all these wonderful people opened a lot of doors and it was a great experience. But it did, one of the doors it opened was this attention, yes, to what I look like. And I still find that shallow and frustrating, if I'm honest. And it's interesting, isn't it, that we're in a time now

where, you know, for women, for many years, that was something that was always discussed. And I kind of, I, but fortunately, we're turning a corner now where if, you know, if the same conversation were to be applied to a woman, they'd quite rightly be able to say, you know, that's not cool. let's not go there and

it's always been yeah a bit frustrating but it's a very odd subject to talk about because in talking about it also sort of feels like I'm affirming

that you know that you're saying yeah I'm like a good looking but yeah it was a kind of it felt always like a bit of a limitation

weirdly did you try to do things to combat that and the choices that you made For a certain amount of time, yeah, there were certain roles definitely at key moments which I chose because I just thought, oh, well, this will take it away from being that stereotype. I like to think now that I've been doing it long enough and I hope provided enough evidence and variety

that it's not or no longer all people see. But just the other day I was at the Toronto Film Festival and, in at least two or three of the interviews that's all they wanted to talk about my looks and I got to look to them and thought, you know, I'm a 52 year old guy I've got a 30 year career and that's all you're talking about.

Yes. You know, it was very odd. Yes. And again, limiting it just feel, but hey, it's also, it's not like they're insulting me, my God. Right, right. There are worse things to have to keep talking about.

Yeah, yeah. But it is something that fades. So it can't be something you hang your entire life on. It changes, you know. Jute Law, thank you so much. My pleasure. Jute Law stars in the new Netflix series, Black Rabbit.

There's a lot of new music being released this fall, and rock critic Ken Tucker has chosen to showcase new songs by three very different acts. Big Thief has a new album, and their sound is characterized by the intimate lead vocals of Adrian Linker, as does Zach Topp, a young country singer with roots in old country. There's also the Icelandic Chinese singer Levei, who brings a classical music and jazz influence to her pop songs. Here's Ken's review of this eclectic gathering. Few bands have been as widely acclaimed in pictures of another from the future or the past, what's lost or waiting.

Few bands have been as widely acclaimed in recent years as big. Big Thief, whose signature sound is the haunting voice of Adrian Lanker. Big Thief's new sixth album, I just played a bit from the title track, Double Infinity, finds the former quartet now a trio, but its sound has expanded with the addition of backup singers for the first time. Whether Lanker's vocals needed backing is up for debate, but it certainly added a chummy collegial air to this album. On the song called Los Angeles, from Brooklyn, New York, soaks up the L.A. sun and heat

and turns out a warm hymn to cross-continental friendship. Where Adrian Lanker's voice swoops and sores, Zach Topp's voice has a pinched nasal tone that connects this 27-year-old all the way back to classic country crooners like Lefty Frizzell and Webb Pierce. Top is enough of a craftsman that he can fill a funny song like Good Times and Tan Lines with so many amusing little details and vocal curly cues

that it becomes something more substantial than a novelty. Little bit of dust, little bit of smoke, baller in a Chevy down a gravel road. Headed to a spot, everybody knows. A cannonball swinging from an old freight row. Talking about good times and tan lines, cold beer and summer nights, that was all there was to life.

Good times and tan lines. Good, good times and tan lines. Zach Topp's big hit singles and new album Ain't In It for My Health signal a shift in country music, which has spent recent years emulating hip-hop rhythms. Top is making popular a new variation on the neo-traditionalist country music of the 1990s. Top addresses the gap between hipster country and his own retro style in a disarmingly direct manner on country boy blues.

I shined up my picker and slipped on my go-to-town booze. I hit Music City like a good time and honky-talking fool. I've been walking for hours starting to think it wasn't worth a trip Oh, because I kind of feel like a dinosaur down on the Vegas Strip. Yeah, every spot in town's got a drink in a van, so why can't I hear a damn country tune? I've been up and down in all. Now let's take a big swerve from country to classical, specifically the classically trained cellist, pianist, guitar-strumming singer-songwriter called Levei.

all of the ways In which I failed myself I failed all the same I don't think I'm pretty It's not up for debate A woman's best currency's her body Not her brain. They try to tell me, tell me I'm wrong.

But mirrors tell lies to me, my mind just plays alone. With her smooth jazz phrasing and arrangements, the 26-year-old Leve has charmed millions who first became aware of her, her TikTok videos. Leve on her new third album, A Matter of Time, cleverly melds her old-school influences and writes lyrics that have an invigorating sting to them. Listen, for example, to her witty put-down of an egotistical guy called Mr. Eclectic.

But you think you're so poetic quoting epics and ancient prose. As truth be told, you're quite pathetic, Mr. Eclectic, Alan Park. As different as these three acts are, what Big Thief, Zach Top, and Leve have in common is the way they succinctly summarize both the allure

and the flaws of the people they've fallen in or out of love with. You end up either wishing you were the object of their admiration, or glad you're not on the receiving end of their criticism. Ken Tucker reviewed new music by Big Thief, Zach Top, and Lave. Coming up, we hear from Pedro Pascal. This year alone, he's appeared in Celine's song's romantic drama material. realists, Ari Aster's Eddington, and the Fantastic Four First Steps. I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is Fresh Air Weekend.

On the TED Radio Hour podcasts, scientists at Alphabet's Moonshot Factory tackle big, serious global problems, but their leader likes to show up on rollerblades, sometimes dressed as Gandalf. My way of trying to disarm people and remind them, humor and silliness are very close to the wellsprings of creativity. Listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. 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.

This summer alone, his face has been splashed across posters and billboards for the Fantastic Four First Steps, Eddington, and Celine's song's materialists. 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. In the past decade, Pascal has become one of Hollywood's most magnetic leading men, often playing reluctant protectors like in the Mandalorian and The Last of Us, who find family in the unlikeliest of places. 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. 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. 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 Pescal is as nice as he seems. Pedro Pescal, welcome to fresh air. What was it about acting? Because you started talking about wanting to be an actor at like four years old.

Well, it was born in 75. And just think about seeing E.T. in the movie theater. You know, think about seeing poltergeist and the goonies and, you know, gremlins and, you know, So I was a very, very easy source of building a fantasy of, of, you know, wishing you were either living these adventures, experiencing these adventures, or part of the adventure of telling those stories. Yeah. You know? I keep coming across these little details, like you being obsessed with the color purple. Yeah.

James Baldwin for colored 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? You were a deeply feeling child. But what did these worlds provide for you? 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. Well, I think being moved, you feel very alive. You feel very inspired, you know, and in school, in a way. by incredible storytelling, incredible performances, incredible literature, you know? So the process around the color purple is very interesting because we had cable TV, and Whoopi Goldberg had a televised show

that had been transferred to Broadway and then shot for television for HBO. It was just called Whoopi. Yes. And she was playing a bunch of different characters. and I was just floored. It was magic. And with that show, Whoopi, I mean, I saw that so many times I could do some of her monologues.

The hair and the towel. Oh, my gosh. And he said, okay, I said, okay, we said, okay, okay. And I mean, I literally haven't, I haven't seen that since I think the 80s, you know, and it's imprinted, right? And then 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 Stephen Spielberg's name on it and her name, Whoopi Goldberg, in the color purple. And I'm just like, here I am completely moved by the marketing of it. 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 purely freshman experience, her first time on camera, on film, her first movie role.

Right. 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. I would hold it like a, like a, like a, like a treasure.

Your mom saw this in you. She, she saw this and wanted to connect with you because of it. You guys would have these family movie nights. Yeah, yeah. My dad, my dad was, my dad was the, was the, was the moviegoer. My mom was selective. Mm. She would fall for, she would notice much more if I, if I was like really into a book.

book. Or if Prince was in it. So you were a big Prince, Prince. But she was... No, she was the Prince fan. She was the huge Prince fan, which, by proxy, made me a big Prince fan. And that's around Purple Rain time. Oh, yeah. What were these movie nights like, these family movie nights? Well, Purple Rain is a perfect example of where we all went together. 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? And I guess they're sort of, you know, my most special memories were a very sort of like movie-going family. My older sister has a love of dance 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 a really hilarious production of a midsummer night stream and then started to kind of really appreciate the kind of storytelling that happened through dance.

Did you ever dance? I didn't. I didn't dance. I mean, I danced, you know, like at any chance I got. Yeah, to Prince and stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I danced around the house. Yeah. I danced around my parents' parties, Christmas, New Year's.

All that stuff. 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 postmodern style of improvisational dance in college. And that was the only work I could get when I graduated, actually, were through movement professors. doing a lot of downtown stuff. When you say downtown, what do you mean?

South of 14th Street. St. Mark's Church. Lower East Side, East Village, site-specific performances, this piece called Demeter's daughter that was conceived by a choreographer named Tamar Rogoff, who is a lifelong family friend and mentor

to Claire Danes. What kinds of stuff would you do for them? Like post-modern dance, Like, you know, sort of create movement and dance. And then it wasn't the kind of thing like, this is the choreography, learn it. It was like, let's move and let's write this together. Kind of like improvisation, but for the body. For body movement.

I'm so fascinated about that physicality because there is a holding of the body and all the characters that you play. I'm thinking about in The Last of Us. Like, how would you describe what Joel is holding in his body? Yeah, holding a lot of trauma, one. And then in a more simple way, this is a man who works with his hands. He's a contractor, and he builds things. He, I think, expresses himself. through his physical relationship to work

and to maintenance and that kind of thing so it's sort of like understanding a person who works very roughly with his hands and is in sort of very consistent relationship to physical labor you know

in a way that he probably loves because it's way easier than having a conversation Right, right. 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. There's so much silent power and what you're doing, but it's through your body that you're telling the story. Well, Game of Thrones being a perfect example of, like, experiencing, you know, that level of exposure for a part. And one would argue that what the role is most known for is the fight. Yes.

And that is more dance than you can possibly believe if you don't want to get killed anyway. You know, that is that is that is physicality in its purest form. And that is choreography in its purest form. So it's just ironic because I was already pushing 40 when that job happened. And so the doors that opened were, 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. Having had a lot of fight choreography on stage, you know, in Shakespeare and all that, but this was like another level. Your family history is fascinating because your parents fled Chile when you were a baby. Growing up, what was the story that you heard?

You know, I didn't hear any stories about it, actually. And I hear stories now because I ask. And I also am met with the sort of desire to share and desire to tell what it meant for, you know, my father's sister. to say goodbye to their brother in that way for my mother's family to live in the terror of the experience of her going into hiding. 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. Yes. We had asylum in Denmark first, and we're likely to stay there, were it not for somebody, that helped hire my father into his lab in San Antonio, Texas.

Why were your parents exiled? Oh, well, they were involved in the opposition movement against the military regime under Pinochet. They were, again, the supporters, and frankly, just very young, and liberal. And my mother's side of the family, there's a cousin of my mother's Andres Pascal, who was a leader of the opposition movement. and so that I think just by association

sort of could put the name and family in peril but there was 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 and he'd been shot in the leg and the um it was a it was a priest who brought him over to uh to our house and um and you know at this

point i'm an infant so obviously i have no memory um but uh the priest was taken into custody and he was tortured and he gave names and and then they went looking looking for my parents and and you know and so they they had to you know go into hiding and and find a way to survive. There are a lot of details that kind of go into it that create like such a fascinating story. The odd circumstance of my father finding out that someone was in the lobby asking for his name and a patient that kind of like interrupted the moment where the officer wanted to, was about to ask my father who he was or his name. if he was doctor, in fact, Dr. Balmaceta, and a patient that was like, you know, I'm in pain and no one is attending to me. And I almost wonder, I mean, you know, you've got to be careful because, you know, how much story do you build around it and what's really real?

But this was this chance circumstance that gave my father the opportunity to sneak out the back to go and get my mother and go and go into high. And they were right because they came to the house. They ran. They tore everything apart. And it was about six months before they found a plan to sneak into the Venezuelan embassy and claim asylum and be reunited with my sister and I. What a story to learn in adulthood. It's not a lore. It's not a story you grew up knowing and having pride. Right. I had a sense of it. I remember one very, very vivid experience of seeing the movie missing. See, this is the funny thing. is that like here we are this nuclear family in the suburbs of San Antonio, Texas with this not distant legacy of escape. I mean, the dictatorship was continuing on and I'm seeing a movie about it in my house

and Sissy Spacic is the size of my mother. Right, because the age of my mother and the movie missing right by Costa Gravas and her, you know, being, out in the streets past curfew by accident and her life being in peril and me somehow putting all of that together and understanding that sort of placing my mother in that circumstance as a child and just like absolutely falling apart. How old are you?

When the movie came out in, I must have been like, I don't know, maybe seven. Wow. Yeah, it was a different time. Parents were letting us, parents were letting us watch wood. whatever was on TV. But I'm saying, wow, about you piecing that together and somehow understanding Sissy's basic is my mom. Yeah, feeling that way.

Feeling that way in that moment. And it had to stop. I fell apart. You literally started crying. Oh, I started, I mean, it was like, you know, I think something, you know, bordering on howling. I was, I was, I was, I was so traumatized. by the idea.

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? Unfortunately, I wonder if she understood. But, yeah, I guess just to answer it simply, no, not really. When you say you wonder if she understood, what do you mean? If she understood that I was kind of a son who was scared for her, you know.

and kind of absorbing the context but not really knowing how to process the context. Movies have been so important to you in your life. Everything. Yeah. They allow you to understand the world. Yeah, yeah. And now you're doing that for other people.

Do you ever think about it like that? I feel profound gratitude to be doing something that I love to do and the people that I get to do it with. And being sort of always a part of an experience, you know, whether it's well received or not, but always like everyone involved is putting their entire selves and bodies into, you know, and cares so much about making it. And it's very bonding, it's very fun, and I don't know anything else. Oh, Pedro. This has been great. Thank you, Tanya.

Thank you so much for having me. I can't tell you. This is part of my little pinch me moment. 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. And getting to sit here with you is very special.

Pedro Pascal stars in The Last of Us. His latest films are The Fantastic Four First Steps, Eddington, and Celine Song's materialists. Fresh Air Weekend, is produced by Teresa Madden. Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our managing producer is Sam Brigger.

With Terry Gross, I'm Tanya Mosley.