Antonio Banderas Reveals How a Heart Attack ‘Changed’ His Perspective, Inspired Him to Leave Hollywood

The Mask of Zorro actor Antonio Banderas said goodbye to Hollywood after a near-fatal heart attack in 2017, and returned to his hometown of Málaga, Spain.

In an interview with The Times published on Wednesday, March 25, Banderas, 65, called his health scare “a really serious warning.”

“It changed the way I look at life,” he explained. “Faced with death, it made me look back and realise that I am, in fact, a theatre actor.”

Banderas ultimately sold his private jet, along with some real estate, quit smoking and purchased a not-for-profit theater in southern Spain.

“The opportunity arose to buy this venue, a former cinema, which was in a state of disrepair and full of asbestos. It was awful. So I cleared it out and built it inside its shell,” the Puss in Boots star told the outlet. “It keeps me in touch with my roots, my neighborhood, my people. I haven’t lost that connection over the years. Quite the opposite.”

Banderas — who shares daughter Stella with ex-wife Melanie Griffith, and is step-father to actress Dakota Johnson — revealed, “I have never been so happy,” adding that the locals call him “José Hollywood.”