Armando Silvestre, a busy actor in the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema who appeared with Clint Eastwood and Shirley MacLaine in Two Mules for Sister Sara, with Yul Brynner in Kings of the Sun and with Burt Lancaster in The Scalphunters, has died. He was 98.
Silvestre died June 2 in Coronado, California, a representative from the Aztlan Mortuary in nearby La Mesa told The Hollywood Reporter.
The powerfully built Silvestre made scores of films in Mexico, among them Here Comes Martin Corona (1952), Rossana (1953), Story of a Mink Coat (1955) with Silvia Pinal, La Sombra Vengadora (1956), The Miracle Roses (1960), Neutrón Contra el Dr. Caronte (1963), La Choca (1974) and Faith, Hope and Charity (1974).
He excelled in Westerns and action adventure movies early in his career en route to compiling more than 200 credits on IMDb.
Armando Silvestre Carrascosa was born in San Diego on Jan. 28, 1926, and raised in Tijuana. His younger brother was Eduardo Silvestre, winner of the Mr. Universe contest in 1959. He left college to become a bullfighter, but after being gored, opted to pursue acting.
Silvestre appeared in the 1948 films Tarzan and the Mermaids, starring Johnny Weissmuller, and Mystery in Mexico, directed by Robert Wise, then landed a leading role in Lola Casanova (1949), a Western made in his home country.
Other early U.S. credits included Wyoming Mail (1950) and Apache Drums (1951) — both starring Stephen McNally — Mark of the Renegade (1951), starring Ricardo Montalbán, Cyd Charisse and Gilbert Roland; Thunderbirds (1952); and The White Orchid (1954), starring Peggie Castle.
He later showed up in such other American films as For the Love of Mike (1960), starring Richard Baseheart; Geronimo (1962), starring Chuck Connors; Rage (1966), starring Stella Stevens and Glenn Ford; and The Children of Sanchez (1978), starring Anthony Quinn and Dolores del Rio.
And he guest-starred on American TV series like Daniel Boone, The F.B.I., Police Woman, Bracken’s World, Mannix and Wonder Woman.
More recently, Silvestre worked on the telenovelas La Impostora in 2014 and Despertar Contigo in 2016-17 and was preparing a return to the stage.
Survivors include his wife, Blanca Estela Limón, an actress and casting director, and his daughter, Anabel.
“He was a great human being, a great husband, a great father, a great friend, a great athlete and a great actor at a national and international level who made Mexico stand out,” his family said.
