The actress who starred in the James Bond movie 'No Time to Die': Who is Ana de Armas?

Ana Celia de Armas Caso, with her full name, was born on April 30, 1988 in Havana, Cuba, and grew up in the city of Santa Cruz del Norte. Her maternal grandparents were immigrants from Spain to Cuba. Her father, Ramón, held a variety of jobs including bank manager, teacher, school principal, and deputy mayor of a town. Her mother, Ana, was working in the human resources department of the Ministry of Education. De Armas has an older brother named Javier, who is a New York based photographer.

During her childhood and adolescence, Armas had no internet access and had limited knowledge of popular culture outside of Cuba. Her family didn't have a "video or DVD player" and was watching Hollywood movies in her neighbor's apartment. She memorized and practiced monologues in front of a mirror. At the age of 12, she decided to become an actor.

In 2002, at the age of 14, she auditioned to join Havana's Cuban National Theatre. She made three movies while she was a student. She dropped out of the four year drama course months before presenting her final thesis because Cuban graduates were not allowed to leave the country without completing their three year mandatory service to society. At the age of 18, with Spanish citizenship through her maternal grandparents, she moved to Madrid to pursue her acting career.

De Armas starred in Manuel Gutiérrez Aragon's romantic drama "Una rosa de Francia (2006)". After meeting her, Cuban actor Jorge Perugorría suggested that the director consider Armas for the role as well. The director visited de Armas' theater school and interrupted the sixteen year old during the audition to let her know that the role was her. She traveled to Spain as part of the film's promotional tour and was introduced to Juan Lanja, who would later become its Spanish representative. She then starred in El edén perdido (2007) she. She then played a supporting role in Fernando Pérez's Madrigal (2007), filmed at night without the permission of the drama school teachers.

At the age of 18, de Armas moved to Madrid. Within two weeks of arriving, she met casting director Luis San Narciso. Two months later, she cast her as Carolina in the TV series El Internado, where she played for six seasons from 2007 to 2010. The television show, set in a boarding school, became popular with viewers. And it made de Armas a famous figure in Spain. When she took a break from filming, she starred in the successful coming of age comedy Mentiras y Gordas (2009).

After spending several months in New York learning English, de Armas was persuaded to return to Spain to star in seventeen episodes of the historical drama Hispania (2010–2011). She then starred in Antonio Trashorras' horror films El callejón (2011) and Anabel (2015), and the drama Por un puñado de besos (2014). During her long absence from acting, Armas attended Tomaz Pandur's workshops in the Madrid theater troupe.

At the encouragement of her newly hired Hollywood agent, she decided to move to Los Angeles. When De Armas first came to Los Angeles in 2014, she had to start her career "from scratch". She spoke very little English and didn't know what she was usually called during auditions. She spent four months in full time training learning English, she didn't want to be limited to playing characters written specifically for Latin actresses.

She made her Hollywood debut with Keanu Reeves in Eli Roth's erotic thriller Knock Knock (2015). Despite receiving positive reviews for the film, de Armas was not found to be "convincing" in the role. Keanu Reeves then phoned Armas to invite her to play a Spanish role in the thriller Daughter of God, which she starred and produced. Producer Mark Downie hoped the film would also be a star vehicle for de Armas. However, due to executive intervention, Daughter of God was severely edited, with de Armas' leading role reduced. The movie was eventually released as Exposed in 2016. Despite being "attractive" in her role, de Armas was commented on as she failed to show the "intense emotional demands of her character".

De Armas played a supporting role in Todd Phillips' War Dogs (2016) and relearned her lines vocally. She starred alongside Édgar Ramírez in the biopic Hands of Stone (2016) as the wife of Panamanian boxer Roberto Durán. Despite its delayed release, Hands of Stone was de Armas' first Hollywood movie. And thanks to this movie, she experienced a rise in her career.

In Denis Villeneuve's futuristic thriller Blade Runner 2049 (2017), de Armas had a supporting role as Joi, the AI holographic girlfriend of Ryan Gosling's character, a blade runner. While the performance was initially discussed as a breakthrough role, the film underperformed commercially. And de Armas spent most of the following year in her hometown of Cuba, where she bought a house.

Also in 2017, she had a supporting role in the action thriller Overdrive. De Armas' role as an immigrant nurse in Knives Out (2019), the mass murder mystery film written and directed by Rian Johnson, was critically acclaimed and broke new ground for the actress. The movie was a huge box office success. De Armas was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Comedy or Musical Film. She also was nominated the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress and the National Board of Review Award for Best Actors for her cast.

De Armas starred in four films that were released in the United States in 2020. She first appeared in a supporting role as the wife of Joel Kinnaman's character in the detective thriller The Informer. She then appeared as a seductive woman in the black crime drama The Night Clerk. Later, she played Carolina Larriera in the Netflix biopic Sergio (2020) alongside Wagner Moura.

De Armas reunites with Moura to play the wife of one of the Cuban Five in Olivier Assayas' Netflix spy thriller Wasp Network. The movie was shot somewhere in Cuba. This was de Armas's first work in her home country since leaving when she was young.

In 2021, Armas reunited with Daniel Craig to play a Bond girl in Cary Joji Fukunaga's "No Time to Die." Fukunaga wrote the character of a Cuban CIA agent with de Armas in mind. She described the character as jovial and very irresponsible. No Time to Die was a commercial success, grossing worldwide and receiving critical acclaim.

De Armas starred in Adrian Lyne's erotic thriller Deep Water (2022), based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith. De Armas and Ben Affleck played a couple in an open marriage. In 2022, De Armas co-starred with Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans in the Russo brothers' Netflix action thriller The Gray Man. Neither Deep Water nor The Gray Man did well among critics and audiences.

De Armas portrayed Marilyn Monroe in the Netflix biopic Blonde (2022), based on Joyce Carol Oates' biographical fiction novel of the same name. In preparation, de Armas worked with a dialect coach for a year, reading Oates' novel. She also said that she reviewed hundreds of photos, videos, sound recordings and films to prepare for the role. Despite criticism of the cast, Armas' performance was also praised for having a notable Spanish accent.

She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress and a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Additionally, she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture-Drama and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role.

De Armas will next star in the Apple TV+ movie Ghosted, which also stars Scarlett Johansson replacing Chris Evans.

Private life

De Armas began a relationship with Spanish actor Marc Clotet in mid-2010 and they were married on the Costa Brava in July 2011. They divorced in early 2013.

She was briefly engaged to American talent agent Franklin Latt during a relationship from early 2015 to late 2016. After meeting on the set of Deep Water in late 2019, de Armas dated American actor Ben Affleck from March 2020 to January 2021.

De Armas holds dual Cuban and Spanish citizenship. She moved to Los Angeles at the age of 26 and lives in New York as of 2022.