Everyone knows that in this day and age, actors with a muscular physique are generally favored by the audience due to obvious reasons yet it seems like we’ve recently run into a shortage of them. The ones who are currently popular are either the ones that have been a part of the industry for a long period of time or ones that go with the only looks-no-skill mindset and end up feeling like oddly muscular puppets decreasing the overall quality of the project they are working in.
Of course, some are an exception but for the most part, the acting industry has evolved from valuing quality over everything else to constantly pumping out material while not caring about the excellence element and how the lack of it decreases the value of the entire industry as a whole.
Yet, some actors still provide originality as well as quality performances in their respective niches. One popular name is that of the Spanish actor, Francisco Javier Pastor, who’s the real deal when it comes to physical prowess along with a commendable screen presence.
At the ripe age of 14, Pastor became spellbound by action movies and stars like Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger. He started going to the gym at the age of 22 in an effort to build a superhuman body and break into the movie business. After receiving his first acting gig as the protagonist’s executor in Milos Forman and Javier Bardem’s Los Fantasmas de Goya (2006), Pastor decided to use his unique physique to his benefit in the film business. In 2007, he was cast in the movie La conjura de El Escorial, directed by Antonio del Real who chose Pastor to play Damiana’s executioner (Blanca Jara).
Pastor portrayed a tormentor in the Belén Macas-directed 2010 miniseries La Princesa de Éboli, who tortured Hugo Silva’s character Antonio Pérez at Nuez de Arce’s command (Alex Angulo). He made an appearance as the goalie who permits Tino Colmenarejo (Paco Tous) and Javi (Adam Jezierski) admission to see Dulce (Henar Jiménez) in 2013 in the third season of Con el Culo al aire. Pastor also played Ramón Martirio Pilón in Se Hace Saber (2013-2014) episode 6.
Pastor appeared in the short film H-positive (2015), directed by Glenn Paton, in which Pastor shared a role with Roger Barclay. He appeared in Águila Roja as a mental nurse for El Comisario (Francis Lorenzo) in 2016. In Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s 2016 film Que Dios Nos Perdone, Pastor portrayed a transvestite who was homeless and insane further displaying his versatility and range on the big screens. He also appeared in several episodes of Mar de Plástico and Looking for the North, in which he was a Turkish bandit. Out of Pastor’s all acting roles, he is mostly known for his character Dragan in La Casa de Papel (English title: Money Heist), to the international audience. Pastor portrayed Dragan on seasons 2, 4, and 5 of the 2017 series. He also had a brief role in the 2018 film, Yucatán directed by Daniel Monzón, portraying the role of a Moroccan cop.
Pastor also portrayed Boxer Marcelo in the 2018 season of El Continental on Netflix and portrayed Yago in the love story Amar es para forever in 2019 and Arturo, Lukas’s opponent, in the Neverfilms serial The Karate Boy.
On the 2020 television program Dar cera, pulir 0, Pastor was chosen to play Mario, Patricia Conde’s cousin and in the 2021 television series Luimelia, he portrayed Pedrito. Additionally, in the recent smash hit Los renglones torcidos de Dios, which had its Spanish debut on October 6, 2022, and will soon be accessible on Netflix, he played the lead role. Pastor plays the part of Hombre Elefante (The Elephant Man), a hospital patient in the movie.
It’s no hidden fact that the film industry is going through a rather dull phase right now but it’s actors like Francisco Javier Pastor who come forth and display performances that not only show their range as an actor but their versatility and willingness to take risks in order to provide audiences with the kind of entertainment expected from an industry of such a large scale.
