Pedro Pascal on Why He Joined Pedro Almodóvar’s Gay Cowboy Short Film

Acclaimed filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar has enlisted Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal to star in his “answer to Brokeback Mountain,” and now, Pascal has opened up about how he came to join the project.

Strange Way of Life is an upcoming 30-minute film starring Hawke and Pascal as a pir of middle-aged gunslingers who travel across the desert to find each other after 25 years apart.

Pascal told Insider that Almodóvar has long been one of his favorite writer-directors, and so it was an easy decision when asked if he wanted to work with him.

“He absolutely opened up an entire world of storytelling, color, culture, rebellion, and sexuality that was just absolutely intoxicating, dangerous, hilarious, heartbreaking, and encompassing the whole spectrum, but with such a signature style,” Pascal said of the two-time Oscar winning director.

“It could have been anything that he asked me to do, and I would have done it without question,” he added.

He also was overjoyed to get an opportunity to work with Ethan Hawke, his co-star in the project.

"To get to work with Ethan, whose movies I've seen since I was a little kid, who I've seen on stage off-Broadway, on Broadway, whose books I've read, whose plays I've seen him direct, and big movies, small movies, horror movies,” Pascal said. “It was really an incredible opportunity to go, learn, and to enjoy the experience of being on the level of people like that," he said. "Taking it all in was incredible."

Strange Way of Life officially premieres at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.