Actor Juan Manuel Bernal's Sacrifice: Balancing Career and Time with a Dying Loved One

2023-10-24 02:07:00

Juan Manuel Bernal had to sacrifice time with a loved one to continue with a firm step in acting. (Photo by Pedro González Castillo/Getty Images) (Pedro Martin Gonzalez Castillo via Getty Images)

Dear reader, dear reader, if you are a person who loves or loved your father deeply, let me ask you what you would do or what you did to spend more time with him knowing that he is about to die as a result of a serious illness. Surely the impossible. But sometimes life only gives the opportunity to do what is possible according to the circumstances. However, any moment taken, no matter how small, is worth it. We can appreciate that situation with Juan Manuel Bernal.

In 1999 the actor was split into four at the professional level. His work was divided into film, television and theater. His acting talent combined with his need led him to accept projects that coincided in timing for their completion. He was focused on it without considering that his destiny was also going to place him in front of the last days of his father’s life, which became another primary urgency to attend to.

“My dad was a sickly person. He went through a lot of very complicated things. I have images of my dad rolling around and screaming in pain because he suffered from the trigeminal nerve. Those who suffered from the trigeminal nerve, two to three people, committed suicide. And my dad survived it. We arrived with a neurologist and, thank God, he saved my father’s life,” he tells Yordi Rosado in The interview.

Although his father had been saved, the man’s quality of life in terms of health was affected as a result of the surgery he had to undergo. However, fortunately for the family, this intervention benefited prolonging existence and eliminating intense pain that could lead him to make a desperate decision.

“My dad was left without feeling in half of his body because they cut that part of the trigeminal nerve that made him wallow and scream in pain. The only way to take it away (the pain) was to put your head in an ice bucket. That image of my father was very shocking to me,” describes the actor.

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As usually happens in this type of case, the man got worse. He had to be hospitalized to treat and care for him because he required medical supervision given the situation, since his body entered a stage of accelerated deterioration for which there was no salvation. It was a matter of waiting for the inevitable outcome.

“The end was painful because it was long, a long process in the hospital. What’s more, there came a time when the doctor told us: ‘he can’t die because they won’t let him, everyone is on top of him’… He lived and slept almost in a forum. I got to make two films, a soap opera and a play at the same time. And with a dying father! “That was crazy,” says Bernal about the way things came together to make the imminent loss even more painful.

The actor resorted to planning his schedule to be with his father for a few minutes a day. By participating in four projects, time was against him. He was practically saturated with work. With efforts he managed to make space to live with his old man, but with the pressure of rushing.

“The only time I had to go see him was at the court to eat. They gave me everything in tupperware. My assistant drove for me to get to the hospital, see him for 10 minutes, eat with him and return. During that meal with him and talking, he gave me strength because I told him that I felt very bad, that I was full of commitments and I could see him only a few times a day. And he, as serious as he was, managed to tell me: ‘Do you think I don’t know what you’re doing for me? Work is man’s best friend. Just because you’re there doesn’t mean you’re not with me, I know you’re with me, so go and do the best you can.’ “It was always the biggest advice he gave me when I decided I wanted to be an actor.”

On a psychological level, Bernal was extremely affected. Memorizing dialogues, getting into character, repeating takes, moving from one location to another and living with the mortification that his father would die at any moment, made him a being filled with anguish. Performing in theater with a dense work of black humor that addressed audiovisual violence, filming Without leaving a trace and being a star in the soap opera romantic obsessionthe actor suffered the news that he did not want to hear.

“I have had to give a show, make people laugh while I have my father lying down. (I did it with) Popcorn. My father died when I was doing Popcorn. “I was making a movie with María Novaro and I was making a soap opera with Televisión Azteca at the same time, and my father was in the hospital dying.”

Without neglecting any of his participation, focusing squarely on work, Juan Manuel Bernal said goodbye to his father, a man who asked him to continue with his career instead of tormenting himself by his side in the final stretch. That push from his father to assimilate the goodbye was also a motivation that today has the actor in the place he is; That advice to do the best he could bore fruit and he is currently one of the first actors that Mexico has.