{"id":7691,"date":"2025-11-23T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/?p=7691"},"modified":"2026-07-04T21:24:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T21:24:19","slug":"basque-fact-of-the-week-rising-star-jacob-elordi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/2025\/11\/23\/basque-fact-of-the-week-rising-star-jacob-elordi\/","title":{"rendered":"Basque Fact of the Week: Rising Star Jacob Elordi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-background wp-block-paragraph\">It is always cool to see Basque names on the big screen. Whenever we sit through the credits of a movie, I tend to scan the names to see if any Basque names pop out to me. So, it\u2019s even cooler when the Basque name is also the star of the movie. Jacob Elordi has been getting a lot of buzz and his career has really taken off in the last couple of years. The son of a Basque immigrant, Elordi grew up in Australia before making his way to Hollywood. His most recent film is\u00a0<em>Frankenstein<\/em>, directed by Guillermo del Toro, in which Elordi plays the creature.<br><br>Incidentally, I just saw\u00a0<em>Frankenstein<\/em>\u00a0and really enjoyed it.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-medium\"><a href=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" src=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40-300x300.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-7692\" srcset=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40-1024x1024.png 1024w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40-768x768.png 768w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40.png 1400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Jacob Elordi after his transformation into Frankenstein\u2019s monster. Photo from\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elle.com\/culture\/movies-tv\/a69286347\/jacobi-elordi-frankenstein-transformation-explained\/\">Elle<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Jacob Nathaniel Elordi was born on June 26, 1997, in Brisbane, Australia. He comes from a working class family. His father John is a house painter and his mother Melissa is a stay-at-home mom and waitress. John was born in the Bizkaian province of Marikina-Xeimen while John\u2019s father, Joaquin, was born in Ondarroa. Jacob has three older sisters.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Joaquin had immigrated to Australia to escape Franco\u2019s dictatorship. He originally worked in the sugar cane fields until he saved enough money to bring his mother and his son, John, to Australia. John was eight years old at the time.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Elordi says that he was inspired to become an actor by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Heath_Ledger\">Heath Ledger<\/a>. He started acting in musicals at his school at the age of 12. He was interested in rugby until he hurt his back when he was 14, which pushed him from athletics to acting. It was when he was 15 and reading\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Waiting_for_Godot\">Waiting for Godot<\/a><\/em>\u00a0in\u00a0drama class that he really decided acting was his passion. His father initially discouraged Jacob\u2019s acting ambitions, saying that \u201cacting is a one-in-a-million kind of situation.\u201d Jacob replied by saying \u201cWell, why can\u2019t that one be me? Why can\u2019t I be that one in a million?\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Elordi\u2019s first Hollywood role was as an extra in 2017\u2019s\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pirates_of_the_Caribbean:_Dead_Men_Tell_No_Tales\">Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales<\/a><\/em>. He started gaining fame in 2018 as part of Netflix\u2019s\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Kissing_Booth\">The Kissing Booth<\/a><\/em>. He was about to give up on his Hollywood dream \u2013 he had been sleeping in his car and on friends\u2019 couches \u2013 when he was cast in HBO\u2019s\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Euphoria_(American_TV_series)\">Euphoria<\/a><\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>After that, his career began to take off. In 2023, he played\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Elvis_Presley\">Elvis Presley<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Priscilla_(film)\">Priscilla<\/a><\/em>\u00a0and starred in\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Saltburn_(film)\">Saltburn<\/a><\/em>, for which he received a BAFTA nomination for best supporting actor. Most recently, he starred as the titular monster in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Guillermo_del_Toro\">Guillermo del Toro<\/a>\u2018s\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Frankenstein_(2025_film)\">Frankenstein<\/a><\/em>. His performance in this and other recent films has earned him praise. For\u00a0<em>Frankenstein<\/em>, he spent 10 hours a day in make-up to complete his transformation.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Elordi has made his pride in his Basque ancestry very clear. When a Wikipedia article about him listed his ancestry as Spanish,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.euskalkultura.eus\/english\/news\/jacob-elordi-the-actor-appeared-as-of-spanish-descent-on-wikipedia-he-claimed-and-now-he-appears-as-basque\">he said he wasn\u2019t of Spanish but Basque descent<\/a>, and his grandfather would strangle him if he heard that.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-background wp-block-paragraph\">A full list of all of Buber&#8217;s Basque Facts of the Week can be found in the <a href=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/basque-fact-of-the-week-archive\/\">Archive<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Primary sources: <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eonline.com\/news\/1423216\/jacob-elordi-on-wanting-kids-family-plans\">Jacob Elordi Reveals What Kind of Dad He Wants to Be<\/a><\/em>\u00a0by Brahmjot Kaur, E News;\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jacob_Elordi\">Jacob Elordi<\/a><\/em>, Wikipedia; <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.todoalicante.es\/english\/jacob-elordi-giant-generation-20251011041055-nt.html?ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F\">Jacob Elordi, the Giant of Generation Z<\/a><\/em>\u00a0by Gerardo Elorriaga, Todo Alicante;\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.elle.com\/culture\/movies-tv\/a69286347\/jacobi-elordi-frankenstein-transformation-explained\/\">Inside Jacob Elordi\u2019s 10-Hour Transformation Into Frankenstein\u2019s Creature<\/a><\/em>\u00a0by Emma Fraser, Elle<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is always cool to see Basque names on the big screen. Whenever we sit through the credits of a movie, I tend to scan the names to see if any Basque names pop out to me. So, it\u2019s even cooler when the Basque name is also the star of the movie. Jacob Elordi has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7692,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[836,5,19],"tags":[1975,4227,4228],"class_list":["post-7691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basque-fact-of-the-week","category-diaspora","category-people","tag-australia","tag-frankenstein","tag-jacob-elordi"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/image-40.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2sYNu-203","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7691"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7691\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7693,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7691\/revisions\/7693"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}