Golshifteh Farahani

Golshifteh Farahani basically grew up on stage—she started acting in theater when she was just six. Theater's always been her thing, but she jumped into film at 14 with "Derakhte Golabi" (1998). Not only did she pull that off, but she also snagged Best Actress at the Fajr fest’s international section, which pretty much shot her straight into the Iranian cinema spotlight overnight. Since then, she’s stacked up roles in over 15 films—lots of them scoring big at international festivals. Standouts? There’s Bahman Ghobadi’s "Niwemang" (2006), which took home the Golden Seashell at San Sebastián, and Dariush Mehrjui’s "Santouri" (2007)—the one still banned in Iran, which, I mean, says a lot. Then there’s "Mim mesle madar" (2006) by Rasool Mollagholi Poor, which totally blew up in Iran and even got picked to represent the country at the 2008 Oscars for Best Foreign Film. Things really changed after she starred in Ridley Scott’s "Body of Lies" (2008)—suddenly, she was the first Iranian actress front and center in a big Hollywood flick. The downside? She got banned from Iran after that. Her last film shot in Iran, "About Elly" (2009), bagged a Silver Bear in Berlin and won at Tribeca, so she was still crushing it. Outside of acting, she’s got chops in music—graduated music school, can sing, plays piano and a bunch of other instruments. She’s also fluent in French and English, and now she calls Paris home.