The Trailblazing Katy Jurado
To her family she was María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García, but to film lovers the world round she was known simply as Katy Jurado. In her almost six-decade-long career, Jurado became one of the biggest (and first) Latina female movie stars to break through in Hollywood. Alongside the likes of Maria Felix and Dolores Del Rio, her career would pave the path for Latina’s in Hollywood for years to come. A true icon of both the “The Golden Age of Cinema” (1917–1960) and “The Golden Age of Mexican Cinema” (1936–1959), this is Katy Jurado’s story.
The Beginning
Katy Jurado was born on January 16, 1924 in Mexico City, Mexico. Born into a wealthy family, Katy had a very stable upbringing: her father was a lawyer, her mother was a singer who worked for one of the most important radio stations in Mexico and her cousin, Emilio Portes Gil, was president of Mexico from 1928 to 1930.
At first, young Katy wanted to follow in her father’s footsteps and pursue a career in law. However, as time went on, she found the entertainment industry calling her name.
As she blossomed into a beautiful young woman, filmmakers began to take notice of Katy and invited her to act in their films. One of the first offers came from filmmaker Emilio “El Indio” Fernandez, who offered her a role in his directorial debut, La isla de la pasión (1941). But as her family looked down upon acting as a profession, (despite her godfather being the famous Mexican actor Pedro Ardmendariz) she was forced to turn down the role.
But this didn’t stop the offers from coming in.
In 1943, despite her parent’s wishes, Katy made her film debut in Chano Ureta’s No Matarás. Naturally, her parents were furious and threatened to send the then 19-year-old to a convent as punishment. So, naturally, she did what anyone would do in that situation: she eloped with another aspiring actor, Victor Velazquez, with whom she would have her only children, a son, Victor Hugo, and a daughter, Sandra.
From Mexico to Hollywood
Early in her career, Katy found great success with a string of Mexican-cinema hits like 1943’s La vida inútil de Pito Pérez, 1946’s Hay lugar para … dos and 1948’s Nosotros, los pobres, which paired her alongside Mexican superstar Pedro Infante.
While Katy’s star was quickly rising in Mexico, she still made time for other ventures, working as a movie columnist, radio reporter and bullfight critic. At one of the bullfights she was covering, she was approached by two people that would forever change her life: Budd Boetticher and John Wayne. After noticing her and being struck by her beauty, they told her they wanted to cast her in their upcoming picture, The Bullfighter and the Lady (1951)—without even knowing that she was already an actress. And just like that, without even knowing a word of English, Katy Jurado was off to Hollywood to make her debut American film.
After the release of The Bullfighter and the Lady, Katy was in high demand and soon was cast as Helen Ramirez in Stanley Kramer’s next movie, High Noon (1952), alongside Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. Unlike her previous film, High Noon was more dialogue heavy so this forced Katy to take English lessons so she could deliver her lines with the correct emotion and emphasis. The result was a powerful performance in what would go down as one of the greatest Westerns of the Classic Studio Era — as well as a shiny Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress on her mantle.
Although Katy was now a success in American cinema, she still made films in Mexico, returning fresh off the success of High Noon to make Luis Bunuel’s El Bruto (1953) for which she won the Silver Ariel Award (Mexico’s Oscar) for Best Supporting Actress.
In 1954, she returned to Hollywood to make what would be her biggest critical hit, Broken Lance, alongside acting-legend Spencer Tracy. The role would earn her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress, making her the first Mexican woman and Latina to be nominated for the award, something shared with only two other actresses since then: Salma Hayek for Frida (2002) and Adriana Barraza for Babel (2006).
Later Years
Katy continued to work steadily throughout the years, primarily in the Western genre, but as busy as her professional life was, her personal one was equally up to par. Following her divorce from first husband, Victor Velasquez, Katy found herself in relationships with some of Hollywood’s elite including Tyrone Power, Marlon Brando and Ernest Borgnine, whom she would marry in 1959 and divorce in 1963.
After almost two decades in America, Katy began to become disenchanted with Hollywood and decided to move back to Mexico permanently in 1968. While she now lived back in Mexico, she continued to steadily work over the next 30 years in both countries and Europe, finding herself branching into all three acting mediums—film, television and Broadway.
After a career of spanning almost six-decades and more than 70 films to her name, Katy Jurado passed away on July 5, 2002 at the age of 78 at her home in Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico. Her final film, Un secreto de Esperanza, was released posthumously that same year.
The Role She Played and the Road She Paved
From the very beginning, Katy found herself typecast in ethnic roles where she was (almost) always “the other woman,” “the seductress,” or “the bad girl.” Her “look” was something that wasn’t typically found in movies at the time and it had a profound effect, something Katy noted herself:
“I knew that my body was very provocative,” she said, “but also that I wasn’t beautiful, even if, I admit, my look was different and very sensual.”
The thing is, she obviously was very beautiful — she was just a different kind of beautiful.
Her presence in major Hollywood films help redefine beauty and the Latina image to the masses, as most Hispanic stars that came before her (like Dolores Del Rio and Rita Hayworth) typically had a more European look, whether it was on purpose or not. Katy on the other hand actually looked like a Mexican woman you could find walking the streets of Mexico City, and to have someone authentically representing a population of people that hadn’t been accurately portrayed on screen yet was a big deal.
Not only that, as stated above, Katy was a Latina actress who was genuinely respected by her contemporaries as she was showered with accolades from both her Mexican and American peers, ranging from acting nominations and awards, to a star on the Hollywood Walk of fame and a song by Mexican superstar Juan Gabriel.
While she may have been typecast into supporting ethnic roles that latched on to the “bad girl” Hispanic stereotype, her presence on screen was the first step towards an authentic representation of the Mexican woman (and Latina) on film, and for that she will always be remembered as a trailblazer.
