WATCH: That time Fidel Castro acted as an extra in this forgettable Hollywood flick
In his pre-guerrilla days, the young Fidel Castro was once cast as an extra to sing and dance at the house of a U.S. ambassador in a forgettable 1946 film called Holiday in Mexico. It was around the time the young Cuban law student was entertaining dreams of playing Major League baseball, and was allegedly fascinated by American cinema.
After his unmemorable role in Holiday in Mexico, the clean-shaven Castro allegedly went on to act as an extra in other American and Mexican productions.
That’s according to Juan Carlos Garrido, the director of a Mexican cinematography syndicate. “It’s practically unknown and very controversial — the fact that Fidel, during his youth, acted as an extra in several movies to make a living,” Garrido told Univision.
Garrido, who’s promoting a forthcoming movie on Castro, says that el comandante took advantage of his latino qualities to act as an extra in several musicals, including Easy to Wed (1946) and Bathing Beauty (1944).
Univision reached out to various movie critics and historians in Cuba, but could not confirm that Castro had indeed appeared in those movies.
Still, Fidel Castro the actor even has his own IMDb page with credits for his roles in Holiday in Mexico (1946) and Easy to Wed (1946), among other odd movies forgotten by time he allegedly made an appearance in.
The young Fidel Castro can be seen here as the first background singer on the left, at minute 2:09 of the trailer: