Alfred Molina fights back tears over heartbreaking story about late father

Alfred Molina got candid about an emotional story about his father and how he didn’t support his career choices.

“When I was very young, my dad got me a job as a waiter in the restaurant where he was working,” narrated Molina in an interview with Vanity Fair.

“If I say so myself, I was a good waiter to the point where the management offered me the chance to do a two-week management training course,” he explained.

“I turned it down because I got an acting job. My father says, ‘This acting job, how much are they paying you?’ I said, ‘I’m getting union wage, so 15 pounds a week.’”

Molina’s father, Esteban, did not understand why would his son choose a job that was giving him half of his current salary.

“Wait a minute. You’re making £30 or £35 here. Then you go to making £15?” Molina recalled his father saying, with a look that one reserves for the “mad and the lost.”

The conversation had taken place before the actor was a Tony and BAFTA-nominated actor.

“He stared at me like he didn’t recognise me. The only thing I could say to him was, ‘This is what I love, Dad.’ He never quite got it. I did disappoint my dad. Yeah. If my dad had lived a little longer, he’d hopefully would have realised I hadn’t wasted my time.”

However, the actor noted, after fighting back tears, that over the years his father kept a suitcase “full of clippings and photos and bits from magazines and letters from people that wrote to him saying they saw me.”

He added, “He kept all this stuff, but he never talked about it.”

Molina has gone on to star in notable films such as Chocolat, The Da Vinci Code and Frida. Molina also played the villain Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man 2 and Spider-Man: No Way Home.