Marion Cotillard
Date of Birth
30 September 1975, Paris, France
Height
5' 6?" (1.69 m)
Mini Biography
Academy award-winning Actress Marion Cotillard was born on September 30, 1975 in Paris. Cotillard is the daughter of Jean-Claude Cotillard, an actor, playwright and director, and Niseema Theillaud, an actress and drama teacher.
Raised in Orl?ans, France, she made her acting debut as a child with a role in one of her father's plays. She studied drama at the Conservatoire d'Art Dramatique in Orl?ans. While still a teenager, Cotillard made her cinema debut in the film L'histoire du gar?on qui voulait qu'on l'embrasse (1994). Her first prominent screen role was as Lilly Bertineau in Taxi (1998), a role which she reprised in two sequels: Taxi 2 (2000) and Taxi 3 (2003), this role earned her first C?sar award nomination for Most Promising Actress in 1999.
In 2001 she starred in Les jolies choses (2001) as the twin sisters Marie and Lucie, and was nominated for a C?sar award for Most Promising Actress for her performance.
Cotillard's breakthrough in France came in 2003 when she starred in the film Jeux d'enfants (2003) as Sophie Kowalsky, the daughter of Polish immigrants, opposite her friend at the time Guillaume Canet, with whom she would have a relationship four years later.
Her first movie in Hollywood was Tim Burton's Big Fish (2003), years later she starred in Ridley Scott's A Good Year (2006) alongside Russell Crowe.
In 2005, Cotillard won the C?sar award (France's equivalent to the Oscar) for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Tina Lombardi in Jean-Pierre Jeunet's Un long dimanche de fian?ailles (2004).
In 2007, Cotillard received international recognition for her iconic portrayal of ?dith Piaf in La m?me (2007). Director Olivier Dahan cast Cotillard to play the legendary French singer because to him, her eyes were like those of "Piaf". The fact that she can sing also helped Cotillard land the role of "Piaf", although most of the singing in the film is that of Piaf's. The role won Cotillard the Academy award for Best Actress along with a C?sar, a BAFTA award, and a Golden Globe. That made her only the second actress to win an acting Oscar performing in a language other than English next to Sophia Loren (La ciociara (1960)). Only two male performers (Roberto Benigni for La vita ? bella (1997) and Robert De Niro for The Godfather: Part II (1974)) have won an Oscar for solely non-English parts. Trevor Nunn called her portrayal of "Piaf" "one of the greatest performances on film ever". At the Berlin International Film Festival, where the film premiered, Cotillard was given a 15-minute standing ovation.
Cotillard has worked much more frequently in English-language movies following her Academy award recognition. In 2009, she acted opposite Johnny Depp in Michael Mann's Public Enemies (2009), and later that year had a role in musical Nine (2009) and received a Golden Globe nomination for her performance as Luisa Contini. Time magazine ranked her as the fifth best performance by a female in 2009. The following year, she took on the main antagonist role in Christopher Nolan's Inception (2010), and in 2011 she had memorable parts in Midnight in Paris (2011) and Contagion (2011) and reteamed with Christopher Nolan in The Dark Knight Rises (2012).
In 2011 and 2012 respectively, she appeared on the top of the list of the highest paid actors in France that was released by Le Figaro, she was also the highest paid foreign actress in Hollywood. It was the first time in nine years that a female has topped the list.
In 2012, Cotillard received wide-spread critical acclaim for her role as the orca trainer St?phanie in De rouille et d'os (2012). The film received a ten-minute standing ovation at the end of its screening at the 65th Cannes Film Festival. Cotillard was nominated for Critics' Choice, Golden Globe, SAG, BAFTA and C?sar Awards for her performance in the movie. Cate Blanchett wrote an article for Variety praising Cotillard's performance in "Rust and Bone", the two actresses competed for the Academy Awards for Best Actress in 2008, Cate was nominated for her performance in Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2007) and Marion for her performance in La m?me (2007) and Cotillard won the Oscar.
Her first leading role in a Hollywood movie came in 2013 as Ewa Cybulski, a Polish immigrant who wants to experience the American dream in James Gray's The Immigrant (2013). Cotillard received wide-spread acclaim for her perfomance in the film at the 66th Cannes Film Festival, where the film premiered.
With long-time boyfriend Guillaume Canet, Cotillard gave birth to her first child, Marcel, in May 2011.
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