Ricardo Montalban: a Hollywood legend still abound

Latino Leaders: The National Magazine of the Successful American Latino, June-July, 2004

At 83, with a recently opened theatre bearing his name at the center of Hollywood, tills energetic and charismatic movie star still has too much fuel to stop. From his contemporary, Mexican style villa in Beverly Hills where he is recovering form spinal surgery and beside his wife Giorgiana, Ricardo pauses briefly to answer the revealing questions of the Proust Questionnaire.

For the few who are not liar with the phrase: "Welcome to Fantasy Island", Ricardo Montalban may be Kahn, of Star Trek, or Grandpa Cortez from Spy Kids, but either way, he is a multi-talented actor that has portrayed roles from Indians to outer space villains and everything in between. His career started in the early 50s, when being a Mexican in Hollywood meant that one had to play the bandit or the bad guy. But his self confessed persistence and sometimes stubbornness led him to become one of the few Hollywood icons alive.

While still a young, unknown actor, Montalban fell in love with the younger sister of a famous actress (Loretta Young) "and somehow managed to get acquainted with her in Beverly Hills and in Studio social gatherings. I-Its dream finally, came true when she accepted to marry, him some time later.

Ricardo Montalban not only has accomplished the hard mission of having a successful marriage that produced four children and six grand children, he has also achieved a successful acting career, one where he's still being approached for his talent after 35 years. In addition to that, he established the NOSOTROS Foundation, whose main purpose is to empower Latinos to be successful as well.

* What is your idea of perfect happiness? A good wife, like I have.

* What is your greatest fear? Prejudice.

* What is the trait you most dislike in others? Selfishness.

* What is your greatest extravagance? Grown up toys, like radios and watches.

* What is your favorite journey? A trip that I made with my wife in 1951 all over Latin America, where I showed her what we're made of.

* What do you dislike most about your appearance? I guess ... my nose.

* What or who is the greatest love of your life? My wife, the only love of my life.

* When and where were you happiest? Being in the company of my wife while raising four beautiful children and six lovely grandchildren.

* What other talent would you most like to have? Musical talent.

* What is your current state of mind? I have to be extremely positive because physically everything is negative.

* If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? Physically, that I would have a good spinal cord, and I could walk without pain. Spiritually, to be more constant in maintaining a positive attitude.

* What do you consider your greatest achievement so far? As a human being, convincing my wife to marry me. As an actor, a tour I did of Don Juan in Hell by George Bernard-Shaw, which is the best role I have ever had or will ever have.

* What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? I was in Tokyo playing a kabuki actor in the movie Sayonara, and it was Christmas and I was homesick, and I couldn't learn the movements of the kabuki, which are so exacting. I actually cried out of desperation. It was one of my lowest ebbs as an actor. Eventually I was able to learn them, and I felt very free, because freedom comes from discipline, and that is the most disciplined theater in the world.

* What is your favorite alternate occupation? I would like to play the guitar. And as a young man I wanted to be an engineer and build roads and bridges. That was my ambition.

* What is your most marked characteristic? Tenacity, which sometimes becomes stubbornness.

* What do you most value in your friends? Warmth.

* Who are your favorite writers? Cervantes and Shakespeare, but there are many others.

* Who is your favorite fictional hero? El Cid, because it's not fictional.

* Who are your heroes in real life? My parents, who were totally devoted and who sacrificed a great deal for us, their children.

* What is it that you most dislike? Pettiness.

* How would you like to die? I would like to die after receiving the last sacraments.

* What is your motto? In the purest sense of the word, be adventurous in everything. When you don't know anything you can't love anything. So be adventurous in every way.

The Proust questions give insight into a personality. They were made famous by early 20th-Century French novelist Marcel Proust, who, with Franz Kafka and James Joyce, is regarded as one of the fathers of the modern novel. His stunningly precocious and deep answers to the questions at the age of 13, and then more mature replies to the same questions at age 20, left the western world agape, and made Proust the talk of many a dining room and salon.