Mélanie Laurent facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Mélanie Laurent
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Laurent at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival
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| Born | 21 February 1983 Paris, France
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| Years active | 1997–present |
| Spouse(s) | Unknown (kept private) (m. c. 2013) |
| Partner(s) | Julien Boisselier (2005–2009) |
| Children | 2 |
Mélanie Laurent (born 21 February 1983) is a French actress, director, and singer. She is famous in France and around the world for her roles in many popular movies. She has won two César Awards, which are like the French version of the Oscars.
Many people know her from big international films like Inglourious Basterds (2009), Now You See Me (2013), and 6 Underground (2019). She started acting when she was only sixteen years old.
Her first big success in France was for the 2006 movie Don't Worry, I'm Fine. For this role, she won a César Award for Most Promising Actress. She became famous in Hollywood after playing Shosanna Dreyfus in Quentin Tarantino's war film Inglourious Basterds. This role won her several awards from film critics.
Besides acting, Laurent is also a talented director and singer. She has directed several films and released a music album.
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Early life
Mélanie Laurent was born in Paris, France. Her mother, Annick, was a ballerina, and her father, Pierre, is a voiceover actor. A voiceover actor provides the voice for characters in movies or TV shows. Her father is the French voice for the character Ned Flanders in The Simpsons.
Laurent's family has a history connected to film and the arts. Her mother is Jewish, with family from Poland and Tunisia. Her grandfather survived being sent away from Poland during World War II.
When she was a teenager, Laurent visited the movie set of Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar with a friend. The famous actor Gérard Depardieu was there and asked her if she wanted to be in movies. She said, "Why not?". He told her not to take acting classes because she already had natural talent. At age 16, Depardieu gave her a role in the movie The Bridge.
Acting Career
2006–2008: Early Success in France
After her first role, Laurent appeared in several French films. She played small parts in movies like the drama The Beat That My Heart Skipped and the war film Days of Glory.
Her career took a big step forward in 2006 with the movie Don't Worry, I'm Fine. She played a 19-year-old girl who is very sad because her twin brother is missing. Her performance was so good that she won a César Award for Most Promising Actress.
In the same year, she starred in the comedy Dikkenek. For this role, she won an award for Best Female Newcomer. She also appeared in the 2008 film Paris, which had a large cast of famous French actors like Juliette Binoche and Romain Duris.
2009–2010: Hollywood Breakthrough
In 2009, Laurent got her first major role in an American movie. She was cast as Shosanna Dreyfus in Quentin Tarantino's film Inglourious Basterds. She starred alongside famous actors like Brad Pitt and Christoph Waltz. In the movie, her character wants to get revenge on the Nazis during World War II.
The film was a huge success all over the world. Critics loved Laurent's performance. They said she brought "heart and soul" to the movie. For her role as Shosanna, she won Best Actress awards from the Austin Film Critics Association and the Online Film Critics Society. This movie made her a star in North America.
In 2010, Laurent starred in The Round Up. This French film tells the true story of the mass arrest of Jewish people in Paris in 1942. Critics praised her performance as a nurse who tries to help.
2011–present: International Star
In 2011, Laurent starred in her second Hollywood film, Beginners, with Ewan McGregor and Christopher Plummer. She played a French actress named Anna. The movie received great reviews.
Two years later, she appeared in the hit movie Now You See Me. She played an Interpol agent trying to catch a group of magicians who rob banks. The film was very popular with audiences.
She also starred in the thriller Enemy (2013) with Jake Gyllenhaal. In this film, Gyllenhaal plays two men who look exactly alike, and Laurent plays the girlfriend of one of them.
Laurent has also done voice acting. She was the voice of Mary Katherine in the French version of the animated movie Epic (2013). She also voiced the character Disgust in the French version of Pixar's Inside Out (2015).
In 2018, she starred in the drama Operation Finale. The film is about the real-life capture of the high-ranking Nazi officer Adolf Eichmann.
Filmmaking Career
Besides acting, Laurent is also a successful director. She directed her first short film, De moins en moins (Less and Less), in 2008. The film was nominated for an award at the famous Cannes Film Festival.
Her first full-length movie as a director was The Adopted (2011). Her second film, Breathe (2014), was also shown at the Cannes Film Festival and received very positive reviews.
In 2015, she co-directed a documentary called Tomorrow. The film is about finding solutions to environmental problems. It was a big success and won a César Award for Best Documentary Film.
She made her first English-language movie as a director in 2018 with Galveston, starring Ben Foster and Elle Fanning. She has continued to direct films for companies like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.
Music
In 2011, Laurent released her first music album, called En t'attendant (which means Waiting For You). It has twelve songs. She worked with the Irish musician Damien Rice on some of the tracks. The album was released in Europe and appeared on the music charts in France and Belgium.
Personal Life and Other Work
Laurent is married and has two children, a son named Léo (born in 2013) and a daughter named Mila (born in 2019). She keeps her family life very private. As of 2019, she lives with her family in Los Angeles.
She is also very active in protecting the environment. She has worked with Greenpeace to protect rainforests in Indonesia. She is a Climate Ambassador for a campaign started by former United Nations leader Kofi Annan.
Laurent has also worked to stop overfishing (catching too many fish from the sea). She was part of a campaign called Fish Fight France, which helped create a new European law to protect fish populations.
Filmography and Awards
Mélanie Laurent has acted in more than 40 movies and directed 10 films. She has won many awards for both her acting and directing.
Her role in Don't Worry, I'm Fine won her a César Award. Her performance in Inglourious Basterds earned her Best Actress awards from several film critic groups. Her documentary Tomorrow won the César Award for Best Documentary Film.
Discography
| Year | Album details | Chart positions | |
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| BEL | FRA | ||
| 2011 | En t'attendant.
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23 | 35 |
See also
In Spanish: Mélanie Laurent para niños
