Ana Celia de Armas Caso, known professionally as Ana de Armas, is a Cuban-Spanish actress born on April 30, 1988, in Havana, Cuba.
She was raised in the small town of Santa Cruz del Norte, where she grew up during Cuba’s challenging Special Period, marked by economic hardships including food rationing and power outages.
Her father, Ramón de Armas, held various jobs such as bank manager, teacher, school principal, and deputy mayor, while her mother, Ana Caso, worked in the human resources department of Cuba’s Ministry of Education.
De Armas’s maternal grandparents were Spanish immigrants from northern Spain, which later allowed her to obtain Spanish citizenship.
From a young age, she dreamed of becoming an actress, enrolling at the National Theatre School of Havana at age 14 and graduating after four years.
At 18, she moved to Madrid, Spain, to pursue her career, leveraging her Spanish heritage. In 2014, she relocated to Los Angeles to break into Hollywood, learning English intensively despite initially speaking only Spanish.
Siblings
Ana has one older brother named Francisco Javier de Armas Caso, who is based in the United States and works as a photographer.
Often referred to simply as Javier, he grew up with her in Havana, sharing a close bond during their childhood in Cuba.
While de Armas pursued acting and moved abroad to chase her dreams, Javier has maintained a lower public profile, focusing on his photography career in New York.
Career
Armas began her acting career in her native Cuba, making her film debut at age 16 in the romantic drama Una rosa de Francia in 2006, directed by Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón.
After moving to Madrid at 18, she gained prominence with her role as Carolina Leal Solís in the popular Spanish teen drama series El Internado, which aired from 2007 to 2010.
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She continued working in Spanish-language films and television, including roles in series like Hispania, la leyenda from 2010 to 2012, and films such as the horror-comedy Faraday in 2013.
In 2014, determined to expand her horizons, de Armas moved to Los Angeles, where she quickly landed her English-language debut in the thriller Knock Knock in 2015, starring alongside Keanu Reeves.
This marked the beginning of her Hollywood transition, followed by supporting roles in films like Hands of Stone and War Dogs, both in 2016.
Her breakthrough came in 2017 with her portrayal of the holographic AI Joi in Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049, opposite Ryan Gosling and Harrison Ford, which earned her critical acclaim.
De Armas achieved widespread recognition in 2019 for her role as Marta Cabrera in the whodunit Knives Out, directed by Rian Johnson, where she held her own among a star-studded cast including Daniel Craig and Chris Evans.
She continued to build her profile with high-profile projects, playing CIA agent Paloma in the James Bond film No Time to Die in 2021, an adulterous wife in the erotic thriller Deep Water in 2022 opposite Ben Affleck, and a CIA operative in The Gray Man in 2022 with Gosling and Evans.
That same year, she took on the challenging lead role of Marilyn Monroe in Andrew Dominik’s biopic Blonde, showcasing her range in a demanding performance.
Accolades
In 2018, Armas was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Blade Runner 2049.
Her performance in Knives Out in 2019 earned her a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, as well as a Saturn Award win for Best Supporting Actress in 2021.
De Armas made history in 2023 with an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her portrayal of Marilyn Monroe in Blonde, becoming the first Cuban actress nominated in that category.
For the same role, she also received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama, a BAFTA Film Award nomination for Best Leading Actress, and a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role.
Additionally, she won the Critics Choice Association’s Latino Cinema Award for Actress in 2022 for Blonde, and the Deauville American Film Festival’s Hollywood Rising Star Award earlier that year.
In 2025, de Armas was honored as the Action Star of the Year at CinemaCon and named the most beautiful female star of the year.
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