Penélope Cruz

Penélope Cruz (born April 28, 1974, Madrid, Spain) is a Spanish actress known for her portrayal of sultry characters. She achieved early success in Spanish cinema and quickly established herself as an international star.

Cruz grew up outside Madrid, where she studied ballet for nine years at Spain’s National Conservatory; she also received intensive training in classical and jazz dance and studied theatre in New York City. At age 15 she won a modeling agency competition and began appearing in music videos and on Spanish television. Her first film roles were in El laberinto griego (“The Greek Labyrinth”; although the film was completed in 1991, its release was delayed until 1993) and Jamón, jamón (1992; “Ham, Ham”). She came to international attention with Belle Epoque (1992; “The Age of Beauty”), a film about an army deserter taken in by an elderly man and his four enchanting daughters. It won an Academy Award for best foreign film. On numerous occasions Cruz worked with the Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, initially appearing in his Carne trémula (1997; Live Flesh) and Todo sobre mi madre (1999; All About My Mother).

Cruz’s first English-language role came in Talk of Angels (1998), which was completed in 1994 but not released for several years. She then appeared in the contemporary western The Hi-Lo Country (1998). Cruz quickly established herself as a prominent actress in Hollywood. She appeared in the romantic comedy Woman on Top (2000) and starred alongside Matt Damon in All the Pretty Horses (2000), a film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s novel of the same name. She starred opposite Johnny Depp in Blow (2001), a film based on the life of George Jung, the most prolific cocaine dealer in the United States during the 1970s. In 2001 Cruz also appeared in Vanilla Sky—a remake of a successful film in which she had earlier starred, Abre los ojos (1997; Open Your Eyes)—and afterward was involved in a highly publicized relationship with costar Tom Cruise.

In the early 21st century Cruz continued to act in both English- and Spanish-language productions. She starred in Head in the Clouds (2004) and later appeared as an unhappily married mother in Almodóvar’s critically acclaimed Volver (2006; To Return), for which she received an Academy Award nomination. Cruz played a woman dreamed of by a man undergoing a midlife crisis in The Good Night (2007) and appeared as the young lover of an aging college professor in Elegy (2008), a film adaptation of the Philip Roth novel The Dying Animal (2001). She then won her first Oscar—for best supporting actress, for her work in Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), in which she starred alongside Scarlett Johansson and Javier Bardem; Cruz and Bardem married in 2010.

In 2009 Cruz appeared in Almodóvar’s Los abrazos rotos (2009; Broken Embraces), provided the voice of a guinea pig in the animated G-Force (2009), and starred in Nine, a musical set in the 1960s that focused on the life of a film director (played by Daniel Day-Lewis). She reteamed with Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), in which she portrayed the strong-willed daughter of the pirate Blackbeard. Cruz then collaborated again with Allen, portraying an Italian prostitute in his ensemble comedy To Rome with Love (2012). In the crime drama The Counselor (2013), she was cast as the girlfriend of a lawyer who becomes involved in a drug deal that goes wrong. The Spanish-language melodrama Ma ma (2015), which Cruz coproduced, featured her as a mother diagnosed with terminal cancer. Her comedic skills were on display in Ben Stiller’s fashion-industry satire Zoolander 2 (2016).

In 2017 Cruz was part of the star-studded cast of Murder on the Orient Express, based on Agatha Christie’s 1933 novel of the same name. She then took to the small screen to play Donatella Versace in the TV series The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story (2018). Cruz also costarred with Bardem in both Loving Pablo (2017), about the relationship between Pablo Escobar and journalist Virginia Vallejo, and Asghar Farhadi’s family drama Todos lo saben (2018; Everybody Knows). She then reteamed with Almodóvar in Dolor y gloria (2019; Pain and Glory), about a director contemplating his life. In Wasp Network (2019), Cruz played the unsuspecting wife of a Cuban pilot secretly working against Cuba’s government.

Cruz earned acclaim—as well as an Oscar nomination for best actress—for her performance in Madres paralelas (2021; Parallel Mothers), a drama by Almodóvar that centres on a relationship between two single mothers while also exploring the lasting influence of Spain’s civil war and the dictatorship of Francisco Franco. Also in 2021 she starred with Antonio Banderas in Competencia oficial (Official Competition), a satire about the making of a movie. In the espionage thriller The 355 (2022), Cruz was part of an all-star cast that included Jessica Chastain and Lupita Nyong’o. Cruz played Laura Ferrari, the wife of carmaker Enzo Ferrari, in Michael Mann’s Ferrari (2023).