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Anthony Quinn around the 1960s photo sourced from

Top 10 Facts about Anthony Quinn

Mexican-American actor Manuel Antonio Rodolfo Quinn Oaxaca is famously known as Anthony Quinn. He is renowned for playing gritty, passionate characters in several critically praised movies both in Hollywood and overseas, “characterized by a raw and elemental virility.”

He appeared in several critically acclaimed and commercially successful films, often sharing the screen space with other prominent actors of the Hollywood Golden Age.

Anthony Quinn appeared in more than 150 films throughout his illustrious career in the film industry. Here are the top 10 facts about him.

1. Quinn was born during the Mexican revolution

Postcard or print of a photo taken during the Mexican Revolution. photo by Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University –

Anthony Quinn was born on April 21, 1915, in Chihuahua, Mexico, to a Mexican-Indian mother and a half-Irish father amid the gunfire of the revolution in the region. Manuela Pallares Oaxaca and Francisco Quinn were both serving on the front lines for Pancho Villa as soldiers and “soldaderas” when Manuela fell pregnant with Anthony and had to leave for Chihuahua.

Manuela fled to the United States when Anthony was just eight months old as a result of the war’s deteriorating economic and social conditions. She paid off a railway engineer so he would let them sneak on in the coal cart.

The family would not be reunited again until Anthony was almost three years old. A second child, sister Estella, was born less than a year later. Extreme poverty led them to seek work as migrant fruit pickers across Texas and California and they eventually settled in East Los Angeles when Anthony was five years old.

2. He worked odd jobs before becoming an actor

Prizefighter, painter, pianist, butcher, boxer, street corner preacher and slaughterhouse worker were just a few of Quinn鈥檚 many occupations. He pondered becoming an architect in addition to pursuing his studies for the priesthood.

Quinn began boxing professionally as a young man to get money. He then studied art and architecture under Frank Lloyd Wright in his Wisconsin studio, Taliesin, at the designer鈥檚 Arizona home. The two men grew close.

Wright supported Quinn when he revealed that he was interested in acting. Quinn claimed that a movie company had given him $800 per week and he was unsure of what to do. Quinn said that the contract was just for $300 per week.

3. He had a speech Impediment

 Frank Lloyd Wright, had Quinn enrol in acting school with the idea of helping him hone his speech for future professional opportunities. 

Quinn’s poor diction annoyed Wright who recommended tongue surgery to facilitate his speech. Ironically, Quinn’s speech deteriorated further after the operation. He sought the assistance of a former actress, Katherine Hamil, to help him learn to speak clearly, in the hopes of earning an apprenticeship with Wright.

4. Anthony launched his acting career in 1936

Publicity photo of Anthony Quinn photo sourced from

After a short time performing on the stage, Quinn launched his film career performing character roles in the 1936 films The Plainsman (1936) as a Cheyenne Indian after Custer’s defeat with Gary Cooper, Parole (in which he made his debut) and The Milky Way, his first motion picture, although he was not credited.

He played “ethnic” villains in Paramount films such as Dangerous to Know (1938) with Anna May Wong and Road to Morocco with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope and played a more sympathetic Crazy Horse in They Died with Their Boots On with Errol Flynn.

5. He got his career breakthrough in 1941

Press photo of (from left) Richard Loo and Anthony Quinn for the 1945 film China Sky photo by RKO Radio Pictures –

A breakthrough in his career occurred in 1941 when he received an offer to play a matador in the bullfighting-themed Blood and Sand with Tyrone Power and Rita Hayworth. In 1942, he co-starred alongside Power in another critical and financial success, the swashbuckling adventure The Black Swan.

In 1943, he had a role in the Oscar-nominated western The Ox-Bow Incident. He co-starred in Sinbad the Sailor (1947) with Douglas Fairbanks Jr .  and Maureen O’Hara.

By 1947, he had appeared in more than fifty films and had played a variety of characters, including Indians, Mafia dons, Hawaiian chiefs, Filipino freedom-fighters, Chinese guerrillas, and Arab sheikhs.

6. Anthony won the Academy Award twice in a decade

American actor Marlon Brando in a publicity photo for the film One-Eyed Jacks (1961) photo by None visible/Paramount Pictures –

Quinn did some of his finest film work in the 1950s and 1960s. Alongside Marlon Brando, he played Mexican revolutionary Eufemio Zapata in Viva Zapata! (1952), a performance that won him the Academy Award for Actor in a Supporting Role.

Quinn received that same honour again for his portrayal of the painter Paul Gauguin in Lust for Life (1956) with Kirk Douglas. He had also starred in Federico Fellini’s  La Strada (1956), which won the Foreign Language Film Oscar. 

7. Quinn was a creative genius

Early in life, Quinn had an interest in painting and drawing. Throughout his teenage years, he won various art competitions in California and focused his studies at Polytechnic High School in Los Angeles on drafting.

Although he had painted and sculpted since the age of six, it was not until the 80鈥檚 that Anthony discovered he could have another career as an artist. He had always sculpted small pieces of stone and wood he found while he was working on film locations in the deserts of North Africa and the Middle East. 

In the 80s he began to enlarge these 鈥淢arquette’s鈥� into full-sized sculptures for the sole purpose of adding beauty to his living spaces. To his surprise, people started asking him where they could buy the artwork.

He was given a one-man exhibition at a gallery in Honolulu, Hawaii and every piece in the show was sold.

8. He had a personal relationship with Mafia boss Frank Costello  

Frank Costello, American mobster photo by Al Aumuller –

Quinn had a personal relationship with New York City Mafia crime boss Frank Costello and other Genovese gangsters. Quinn made an appearance at the John Gotti trial, according to John H.

Davis, author of Mafia Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the Gambino Crime Family. He told reporters he wanted to play Paul Castellano, the boss of the Gambino family after Carlo Gambino. Gotti had Castellano murdered, becoming the boss of the Gambino family thereafter. Gotti was on trial for a variety of felony charges when Quinn visited the courtroom.

9. Anthony wrote two memoirs that are currently archived

He wrote two memoirs, The Original Sin (1972) and One Man Tango (1997), several scripts, and a series of unpublished stories currently in the collection of his archive.

10. He died of respiratory failure

Quinn spent his last years in Bristol, Rhode Island. He died of respiratory failure due to complications from radiation treatment for lung cancer on June 3, 2001, in Boston, at age 86.

Quinn’s funeral was held in the First Baptist Church in America in College Hill, Providence, Rhode Island.