del Toro Comes Aboard as Executive Producer of “Viva”

Life’s a drag for Benicio del Toro

The 48-year-old Puerto Rican actor and Oscar winner has come aboard as executive producer of Vivadirector Paddy Breathnach’s new film having its World Premiere here at the Telluride Film Festival.

Benicio del Toro

An Irish production shot in Cuba en Español, the film is about Jesus, a young man  growing up in Havana who works as a hair and make up artist for drag acts. What he REALLY wants to do is perform on stage himself, a development that leads to major conflicts with his father who has just been released from prison.

Hector Medina stars as Jesus with a supporting cast including Jorge Perugorria and Luis Alberto Garcia. Screenwriter Mark O’ Halloran also is featured in the film.

del Toro was most recently an executive producer of Escobar: Paradise Losta film in which he also starred that had its World Premiere at last year’s Telluride Film Festival.

He has produced other films in which he had roles including Che and The Wolfmanbut his participation in a behind-the-scenes role on Viva appears to be his first in a film he does not appear since Lovesicknesin 2007.

del Toro next appears in Lionsgate’s Sicariowhich debuted at the Cannes Film Festival and will have its North American premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival later this month in advance of its September 18 release.

He’s already getting Oscar buzz for his intensely searing role in the film.

del Toro to Receive Lifetime Achievement Award at San Sebastian International Film Festival

Benicio del Toro is about to add another award to his collection…

The 48-year-old Puerto Rican actor and film producer and Oscar-winner will receive the Donostia Award for Lifetime Achievement at the San Sebastian International Film Festival.

Benicio del Toro III

del Toro’s latest film Escobar: Paradise Lostwill close the Pearls Selection at the festival, which runs September 19-27.

Escobar, written by Andrea di Stefano, tells the story of young surfer Nick who thinks he has landed in paradise when he falls in love with a Colombian girl on a visit to see his brother who is living in the South American country only to have it change when he meets her uncle, Pablo Escobar.

del Toro has confirmed that he’ll come to San Sebastian to present the film and receive the Donostia at the closing ceremony. Di Stefano, Josh Hutcherson and Carlos Bardem will also be present for the film’s Spanish premiere.

del Toro is a favorite at San Sebastian where he has accompanied films from his career.

del Toro won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Steven Soderbergh’s Traffic as well as an Oscar nomination for his work in Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s 21 Grams.

del Toro re-teamed with Soderbergh to star in the biography of Che Guevera Che. The performance won him the Best Actor award at the Palme D’Or Closing Ceremony at the Cannes Film Festival in 2008, and again the following year at the Goya Awards in Madrid, Spain.

He starred opposite Emily Blunt and Anthony Hopkins in Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman and as Lado in Oliver Stone’s Savages.

del Toro was starred as Jimmy, the lead in Jimmy P. The film was screened at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. He was last seen in Guardians of the Galaxy a sci-fi action film for Walt Disney Pictures/Marvel Enterprises, which was released in the beginning of August 2014.

Next year he’ll play Mambru in Fernando Leon’s A Perfect Day and Sauncho Smilax in Inherent Vice, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.

The actor is currently in production on Denis Villeneuve’s Sicaro.

del Toro to Appear in Prada’s Fall/Winter 2013 Campaign

The Devil Wears Prada… And apparently so does The Wolfman.

Benicio de Toro has been cast by Prada’s designer and owner Miuccia Prada as one of the fashion house’s latest models.

Benicio del Toro II

The 45-year-old Puerto Rican actor, who starred in 2010’s The Wolfman, will appear in Prada’s fall/winter 2013 ad campaign.

In addition to del Toro, Prada has cast Harvey Keitel, as well as young actors Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who appearswith del Toro in Oliver Stone’s Savages and Dane DeHaan, who will star in The Amazing Spider-Man 2.

Getting acclaimed film actors to appear in her ads and on her runways is par for the Prada course. Earlier this year, she selected a diverse cast including Gary Oldman, Jamie Bell, Willem Dafoe and Garrett Hedlund to star in the brand’s autumn/winter 2012 men’s ad campaign.

And at the Milan fall/winter collections in January, Oldman, Adrien Brody and Jamie Bell were among the Hollywood A-list celebrities who walked in the Prada menswear show.

First Look: del Toro Playing a Savage in Oliver Stone’s Latest Film…

He won an Academy Award for playing a Tijuana police officer who helps catch drug dealers in Traffic… And, now Benicio del Toro is preparing to switch sides in Oliver Stone’s latest feature.

The 44-year-old Puerto Rican/Spanish actor appears as a menacing Mafioso in the all-star crime drama Savages.

In one of the film’s recently released stills, del Toro is shown blowing what appears to be marijuana smoke into Blake Lively after taking her hostage.

Savages centers on two friends—played by Aaron Johnson and Taylor Kitsch—who happen to share the same girlfriend (Lively) and work together to sell high-quality pot.

Benicio Del Toro On the Set of "Savages"

When the drug-dealing duo resist being muscled by del Toro’s character, the Mafioso has Lively’s character kidnapped. The ransom? Every cent the two made for the last five years. The two friends finally agree to pay but come up with an alternate plan to rescue their girlfriend, get revenge, and then get the heck out of dodge.

Directed by Stone, the movie will include performances by Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Salma Hayek and Demián Bichir, who recently landed his first Oscar nomination.

Savages is scheduled for release on September 28.