Adan Canto, the Mexican-American actor who parlayed his music career in Mexico into becoming a Hollywood leading man, died Jan. 8 after a private battle with appendiceal cancer. He was 42. He portrayed Sunspot in the 2014 superhero film X-Men: Days of Future Past, Paul Torres on the Fox drama series The Following, and AJ Menendez in the ABC prime-time series Blood & Oil. He appeared as Rodrigo Lara Bonilla in the Netflix drama series Narcos, Aaron Shore in the ABC/Netflix political drama Designated Survivor, and starred on Fox’s The Cleaning Lady until his death.
Canto wrote and directed his first short film Before Tomorrow in 2014. His short film The Shot earned several festival awards for Best Narrative Short Film in 2020. Born in Ciudad Acuña, Coahuila, Mexico to Mexican parents, Canto crossed the border daily as a child to attend an American Catholic school in Del Rio, Texas. He grew up riding horses at his grandfather’s ranch in Acuña where his father was a charro. With the encouragement of his mother, Canto began performing on stage as a singer at the age of 7. Canto began acting in a handful of commercials in Mexico City and was soon cast in a television series called Estado de Gracia. Canto eventually turned to the stage after being cast as a lead in the adaptation of Pedro Almodóvar’s All About My Mother.
In 2019, Canto was cast opposite Halle Berry in her highly anticipated directorial debut film Bruised. His declining health prevented him from immediately rejoining the cast for the show The Cleaning Lady’s third season, although, at the time of his death, he had planned to eventually return to the show. Canto met the American sculptor and painter Stephanie Lindquist in 2012 while filming The Following in Brooklyn, New York. Their first artistic collaboration was the short film Before Tomorrow in 2014. The two married in June 2017, and lived in the Hollywood Hills. They had their first child in 2020, and their second in 2022. Canto died of appendiceal cancer on January 8, 2024, at the age of 42.
