Antonio Banderas nervous about playing hometown hero Pablo Picasso

Antonio Banderas twice turned down the chance to play his artistic hero Pablo Picasso, because he felt too much responsibility portraying the fellow Spaniard.

The Mask of Zorro star has finally signed on to play the artist onscreen and will appear as Picasso in the new season of National Geographic's Genius.

"I was offered the chance to play Picasso a couple of times in my life but I said no because it was a big sense of responsibility that it came to me that for whatever reason I didn't accept in those times of my life (sic)," Antonio tells WENN. "This time I felt it was the right time. It's important for me because Picasso has been a very important figure in my life.

"Going to school when I was a little kid, my mother would always cross in front of Picasso's house, where he was born. I am talking about a time in his day when we didn't have too many national heroes, so Picasso crossed paths at a time when we were pretty much isolated by the dictatorship that we were living in, with Francisco Franco in power.

"Picasso was very difficult to put in a corner and forget about. He was bigger than Franco and his shadow was coming to Spain. So I grew up with this projection of this huge artist, who made the people from all around the world fall in love with this art and he was from my hometown."

In the past, Banderas feared he'd face a backlash from his neighbours in Malaga if he didn't serve the town's other favourite son well: "I felt I had to be very careful because if I don't portray him properly I may not be able to go back to my hometown!?" he smiles.

The second season of National Geographic's Emmy-nominated series Genius debuts in April (18).