Katy Jurado
Katy Jurado was a prominent Mexican actress born on January 16, 1924, in Guadalajara, Mexico, into a wealthy family of Andalusian descent. Initially discovered by director Emilio Fernandez, she made her film debut in 1943 and quickly rose to fame by portraying strong female characters that often challenged traditional gender roles. Her breakout performance came in the 1948 film "Nosotros los pobres," leading to a successful career that spanned both Mexican cinema and Hollywood. Notably, she starred in the classic Western "High Noon" (1952), earning Golden Globe nominations and becoming the first Mexican actress to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role in "Broken Lance" (1954).
Despite facing challenges in her personal life and a decline in roles later in her career, Jurado remained a significant figure in the film industry. Her contributions helped expand the range of roles available to Latina actresses, moving beyond earlier stereotypes. Jurado was recognized with numerous awards, including Ariel Awards in Mexico and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She continued to promote her home state of Morelos in the filmmaking community until her death on July 5, 2002, leaving behind a legacy of dignity and grace in her performances that opened doors for future generations of Latino actors.
On this Page
Subject Terms
Katy Jurado
Mexican-born actor
- Born: January 16, 1927
- Birthplace: Guadalajara, Mexico
- Died: July 5, 2002
- Place of death: Cuernavaca, Mexico
Jurado excelled at playing strong women’s roles in Mexican and American films for more than fifty years.
Early Life
Katy Jurado (hoor-AH-doh) was born María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García on January 16, 1924, in Guadalajara, Mexico. She came from a wealthy family of Andalucian ancestry. Her mother was an opera singer who gave up her career to raise her three children. Jurado’s maternal great-great-grandfather had once owned much of the land that subsequently became Texas. The family moved to Mexico City in 1927, and Jurado lived in luxury until their land, on which cattle were raised and oranges grown, was confiscated by the government and redistributed to the poor. Ironically her cousin, Emilio Portes Gil, had been provisional president of Mexico from 1928 to 1930.
When she was sixteen, Jurado was discovered by Emilio Fernandez, an actor, screenwriter, and director who would later become familiar to audiences in the United States for roles in films such as The Wild Bunch. Jurado’s family, especially her aristocratic grandmother, objected to her entering show business. To escape their control she married actor Victor Velázquez.
Life’s Work
Jurado made her film debut in No matarás (1943) and quickly became a star by playing forceful women who often seduced and dominated men. Her breakthrough role came with Nostros los pobres (1948). Too restless to wait around for film roles, Jurado also worked as a radio reporter, a newspaper and magazine columnist writing about films, and a bullfight critic. Actor John Wayne and director Budd Boetticher saw her at a bullfight and cast her opposite Robert Stack and Gilbert Roland in Bullfighter and the Lady (1951), produced by Wayne. Her meager English-language skills required her to learn her role phonetically.
Jurado began alternating between work in Mexico, most notably with director Luis Bunuel’s El bruto (1953), and Hollywood, continuing this practice until her death. Her best-known American film came early on, when she played Gary Cooper’s former girlfriend in the Western classic High Noon (1952), for which she received Golden Globe Award nominations as Best Supporting Actress and Most Promising Newcomer. Her High Noon role was a stereotype, but Jurado carried it off with affecting dignity, showing viewers there was more to her character than appeared on the surface.
Jurado replaced fellow Mexican Dolores del Río in the role of Spencer Tracy’s Indian wife in Broken Lance (1954) and became the first female Mexican actor to receive an Academy Award nomination, as Best Supporting Actress. Divorcing Velázquez, the father of her two children, Jurado moved to Hollywood and worked steadily in American films, mostly Westerns, during the 1950’s, working with many notable leading men. She costarred with Charlton Heston and Jack Palance in Arrowhead (1953), Kirk Douglas in The Racers (1955), Glenn Ford in Trial (1955), Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis in Trapeze (1956), and her fellow countryman Anthony Quinn in Man from Del Rio (1956). After costarring with Ernest Borgnine in The Badlanders (1958), she married this Oscar-winning actor in 1959. The couple made headlines by frequently breaking up and reconciling before finally divorcing in 1963.
After she played Karl Malden’s wife in One-Eyed Jacks (1961), the only film directed by her close friend Marlon Brando, Jurado’s Hollywood career declined. She was soon reduced to a negligible role in an Elvis Presley vehicle, Stay Away, Joe (1968). Following a suicide attempt in 1968, she moved back to Mexico permanently. Her most notable remaining American films were Sam Peckinpaugh’s Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), which reunited her with her mentor, Fernandez; Under the Volcano (1984), directed by John Huston; and The Hi-Lo Country (1998), directed by Stephen Frears. She also costarred with Quinn and del Rio in the Mexican-American production The Children of Sanchez (1978).
In addition to her film work, Jurado starred on Broadway in 1956 in The Best House in Naples, which closed after three performances. In 1975, she costarred with Quinn and Claire Bloom in Tennessee Williams’s The Red Devil Battery Sign, but the play closed in Boston before it could open on Broadway. She costarred with Paul Rodríguez and Hector Elizondo in the 1984 situation comedy a.k.a. Pablo, which was canceled after six episodes. Her final film was Un secreto de Esperanza (2002). Jurado suffered from heart and lung ailments in her final years and died in Cuernavaca, Mexico, on July 5, 2002.
Significance
Katy Jurado’s intense, limpid eyes and thick, full lips made her an exotic beauty, helping her establish a foothold in both Mexico and Hollywood. Her nominations for an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award were unprecedented for Latinas. Predecessors, such as María Montez and Lupe Velez, had been stereotyped into playing hot-bloodied spitfire roles in Hollywood. After Jurado’s triumph in High Noon, the range of available roles for Latinas broadened somewhat, though they were still subject to limitations imposed by the era’s prejudices.
Jurado won Ariel Awards, the Mexican Oscars, for El bruto, Fe, esperanza, y caridad (1974), and El evangelio de las Maravillas (1998), as well as a lifetime achievement award in 1997. In recognition for her work in the United States, Jurado received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1992, the Motion Picture and Television Fund awarded her a Golden Boot in recognition of her contributions to Western films.
Jurado worked tirelessly to promote the use of her home state, Morelos, by filmmakers. Although she was renowned for her smoldering sexuality in the first part of her career, Jurado made an easy transition to playing more maternal roles. By bringing considerable dignity and grace to all her parts, she helped gain more roles for Latino performers in Hollywood and contributed to the slow break from the stereotyped roles of the past.
Bibliography
Cavallo, John. “The Career of Katy Jurado.” Classic Images 186 (1992): 18-19. An overview of Jurado’s films.
Rainey, Buck. Sweethearts of the Sage: Biographies and Filmographies of 258 Actresses Appearing in Western Movies. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1992. A brief look at Jurado’s career, with emphasis on the Westerns in which she appeared.