The Remarkable Career and Tragic End of Mexican Actor and Journalist, Pedro Armendáriz

Pedro Armendáriz was undoubtedly one of the Mexican actors most important of the golden age of national cinema, but he not only worked in acting, he was also a journalist and even a tourist guide.

born as Pedro Gregorio Armendariz Hastings In Mexico City on May 9, 1912, he graduated as an engineer from the California State Polytechnic University where he lived after the death of his mother Adela Hastings, an American national.

Countless are the films in which he participated, but at least two were the ones that led him to the pinnacle of Mexican cinema and even participated in films in United States next to the greats like John Ford.

He began in the world of acting by participating in the plays represented by the theater group of the University of California.

Journalist, tour guide and more

His concern for the world of acting and to rediscover his Mexican roots led him back to Mexico where began his important career.

Already in the Mexico City had to look for life and this led him to work as a journalist, tourist guide and railwayman.

In the world of journalism, he was a reporter for the bilingual magazine Mexico Real, thanks to the fact that he spoke perfect English.

In fact, his big step into the movies was because at to be reciting a monologue from Hamlet to an American touristwas discovered by the film director Miguel Zacarías, according to testimony from Armendáriz himself.

Emilio ‘Indio’ Fernández’s favorite

At the age of 22, he participated in his first film, María Elena, and since then He acted in dozens of films alternating between Mexican and American cinema.

Thanks to his versatility, personality and presence, he was the favorite actor of director Emilio ‘Indio’ Fernández, with whom he would make some of his best films, such as I am pure Mexican, Flor Silvestre, María Candelaria, Bugambilia, La Perla and Maclovia, among the most important.

He also acted alongside great divas of Mexican cinema such as Dolores del Río and María Félixwith whom he made some of the most iconic scenes in Mexican cinema.

In the late ’40s, He made the leap to Hollywood at the hands of John Ford and was also one of this filmmaker’s favorites, appearing in three of his films: The Fugitive, Fort Apache, and Godfathers.

Last role and death

In 1963 he had his last participation in the cinema, in the second film in the James Bond series, From Russia with Love in the role of Kerim Beyhead of the Turkish Secret Service, helping James Bond, played by Sean Connery, in his assigned intelligence mission.

But, by then, Armendáriz was already showing the first symptoms at hip level, he was already limping when he walked, for stomach cancer.

Due to the advance of the disease, on June 18, 1963, Armendáriz committed suicide at the age of 51 by shooting himself with a pistol that he had smuggled into the hospital where he was being treated in the United States.

Pedro Armendáriz was buried in the Panteón Jardín located in Mexico City and although you remember him on the big screen, the Mexican actor who also journalist and tourist guide, among other occupationsis remembered as one of the most important in Mexican cinema.