Antonia Banderas stepped away from Hollywood nearly a decade ago, and he’s now opening up about why.
The 65-year-old actor moved back to his hometown of Málaga, Spain, in 2017 after a frightening health scare prompted a major rethink.
Before returning home, Banderas split his time between the US and the UK, and previously owned a mansion in Cobham, Surrey.
But after surviving a heart attack in 2017, the Evita star said his priorities shifted and his career began to take a different direction.
“Mine was a really serious warning,” he said in a new interview published in The Times. “It changed the way I look at life.”
In the aftermath, he gave up smoking, sold his private jet, and resettled in Málaga. He now shares a flat with his longtime girlfriend, Nicole Kimpel, runs several restaurants, and has poured his energy into Teatro del Soho, a not-for-profit theatre he owns and considers a true passion project.
“Faced with death, it made me look back and realize that I am, in fact, a theater actor,” he reflected.
“I have never been so happy.”
He also looked back on his time building a blockbuster career, saying he’d once been told that, as a Spaniard, his options would be limited to playing villains. That perception, he argued, changed after he took the lead in 1998’s The Mask of Zorro.
“The problem was a few years later I had a mask, a hat, sword and cape and the bad guy was Captain Love, who was blond and had blue eyes,” he recalled.
“Even more important is Puss in Boots because it’s for young kids. They see a cat that has a Spanish, even an Andalusian accent and he’s a good guy.”
Banderas’ filmography includes projects such as Evita alongside Madonna, Spy Kids and the Shrek films.
While his life is now more rooted in Spain, he hasn’t abandoned film work entirely. He has two upcoming movies—Rose’s Baby and Tony—currently in post-production, and he appeared in 2023’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.
In earlier comments, Banderas even described the heart attack as a strangely clarifying turning point.
“It probably was one of the best things that happened in my life. It was like putting glasses on and seeing what was important,” the Spanish-native told Radio Times.
“Since my heart attack, I’m looking only for the pleasure of acting. That’s it. I don’t care about anything else.
“For me, life starts when somebody says, ‘Action!’ – or when the curtain comes up.”
Antonio has credited Kimpel, 40, with helping save his life by giving him asprin during the emergency.
The NHS notes that chewing and swallowing an aspirin tablet (ideally 300mg) while waiting for an ambulance can be life-saving during a suspected heart attack, as it helps thin the blood and improve blood flow to the heart.