Personal details
- Birth Date: 1979-03-09
- Height: 5′ 8½″ (1.74 m)
- Birth Location: Guatemala City, Guatemala
- Children: (2 children) Eugene
- Parents: María Eugenia Estrada
- Professions: Actor, Producer, Soundtrack
Oscar Isaac—yeah, that Oscar—came into the world as Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada, born in Guatemala to a Guatemalan mom and a Cuban dad who just happened to be a pulmonologist. The family packed up and landed in Miami, where Oscar grew up. Before Hollywood came calling, he was jamming out on lead guitar and vocals in The Blinking Underdogs. Guy’s got range. He graduated from Juilliard in 2005, which is basically the Ivy League of acting. His big break? Playing Joseph in The Nativity Story back in 2006, but he’d already popped up in All About the Benjamins (2002) and even popped into TV with Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Not exactly overnight stardom, but steady hustle. The dude kept stacking roles: The Life Before Her Eyes, Body of Lies (rubbing elbows with Leo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe), Agora with Rachel Weisz, and Balibo—where he played José Ramos-Horta and snagged an Australian Film Institute Award. Not too shabby. Fast forward, and he’s working with the Coen Brothers in Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), earning himself a Golden Globe nom. Then boom, A Most Violent Year, Ex Machina—basically, he’s everywhere. Star Wars fans know him as Poe Dameron, and he even popped up as the big baddie in X-Men: Apocalypse. Oh, and he absolutely crushed it in HBO’s Show Me a Hero, bagging a Golden Globe for Best Actor. Off the screen, he’s got two sons with director Elvira Lind and is tight with Pedro Pascal.
Getting the boot from Westminster Christian wasn’t exactly a shocker for him, honestly. The guy was pretty much a walking chaos magnet—always pulling some stunt or another. I mean, setting off a fire extinguisher smack in the middle of the gym? Classic. And don’t even get started on the time he went rogue with a mural, turning it into his own personal comedy show just to get a laugh out of the other kids. They say mischief loves company, and he definitely wasn’t running short on either. Teachers probably had his name permanently etched on the detention list. You could argue he was just a kid trying to spice up the monotony, but, yeah, the school didn’t see it that way. Kinda wild how all those shenanigans snowballed into an expulsion, but hey, some folks are just born to stir the pot. Westminster never really stood a chance against that level of energy.
When I was working on Llewyn Davis, I kept circling back to this idea of resilience—like, real stubbornness in the face of chaos. Buster Keaton kept popping into my head, you know? That deadpan face, eyes that look like they've seen it all and aren't about to flinch, no matter what nonsense is going on. It’s wild, because you could drop a piano on the guy, or have him fall hopelessly in love, but everything just gets soaked up and held inside. That’s what I wanted for Llewyn. He’s got all this mess around him—heartbreak, rejection, New York just chewing him up and spitting him out—but he stays locked up, keeps trucking forward. That’s the comedy in it. It’s not slapstick, it’s not big gestures. The world’s burning and Llewyn just keeps on singing, face barely changing, even if the pain’s all over him.
March 9, 1979
5′ 8½″ (1.74 m)
Konidela Ram Charan
Guatemala City, Guatemala
Yes, Eugene
María Eugenia Estrada and Surekha
46 years old