Olga Kostyantynivna Kurylenko (born 14 November 1979) is a French actress and model. She was discovered as a model at the age of 13 and at the age of 16 moved from Ukraine to Paris to pursue a modelling career. Kurylenko started her acting career in 2005. She found success as an actress for her role as Nika Boronina in the movie adaptation of the video game Hitman (2007), and then rose to fame by playing Bond girl Camille Montes in the 22nd James Bond film, Quantum of Solace (2008). More recently she starred in Terrence Malick's To the Wonder (2012), and alongside Tom Cruise in Oblivion (2013) and Russell Crowe in The Water Diviner (2014).
Early life
Kurylenko was born in Berdyansk, Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union. Her father, Konstantin, is Ukrainian, and her mother, Marina Alyabysheva, who teaches art, was born in Irkutsk Oblast, Russia, and is of Russian and Belarusian ancestry.
Her parents divorced when she was three and she was raised by her mother. Kurylenko rarely had contact with her father, meeting him for the first time after the split when she was eight, and later when she was thirteen.
Career
Kurylenko was discovered by a female model scout while on holiday in Moscow at the age of 13. At the age of 16 she moved from Ukraine to Paris. In 1996, she signed a contract with the Paris-based Madison modelling agency. The following year, by the age of 18, she had appeared on the covers of Vogue and Elle magazines. While working as a model in Paris, Kurylenko supported her mother in Ukraine.
She also appeared on the covers of Madame Figaro and Marie Claire magazines. She became the face of brands Bebe, Clarins, and Helena Rubinstein. She has also modeled for Roberto Cavalli and Kenzo and appeared in the Victoria's Secret catalogue.
Her first acting appearance was in Seal's music video, "Love's Divine" in 2003, but her film career began in France during 2005. She received the certificate of excellence award at the 2006 Brooklyn International Film Festival for her performance in L'Annulaire, and also starred in the Paris, je t'aime segment "Quartier de la Madeleine" opposite Elijah Wood. That same year, she was selected to be the face of Kenzo's new fragrance, Kenzo Amour. She has appeared in all subsequent Kenzo Amour advertisements. In 2007, she starred in Hitman alongside Timothy Olyphant. She had a minor role in Max Payne as Natasha. She played Bond girl Camille Montes in the 2008 James Bond film, Quantum of Solace. In the film she plays the role of a Bolivian Secret Service agent named Camille, who teams up with James Bond to avenge the death of her parents.
She was featured on the cover of the December 2008 issue of the U.S. edition of Maxim magazine and on the cover of the February 2009 issue of the Ukrainian edition of Maxim. In Ukraine the mayor of Berdyansk suggested naming a street after her in early 2008, and she and her mother met Ukraine's First Lady Kateryna Yushchenko in President Yushchenko's family country house.
Kurylenko appeared in Terrence Malick's To the Wonder, shot in fall 2010 in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. She also appeared in Oblivion, a science fiction film starring Tom Cruise and directed by Joseph Kosinski. Kurylenko played Alice Fournier who is the main subject of the spy thriller, November Man.
Kurylenko will star as Marie Curie in the Luc Besson-produced biopic RAD, now set for a release in late 2015 after being in development hell since 2011. French rugby player Sébastien Chabal will portray Pierre Curie.
Personal life
Kurylenko acquired French citizenship in 2001. In 2008, her mother, Maryna Alyabusheva, said "She changed her citizenship from Ukrainian to French long ago." She married French fashion photographer Cedric van Mol in 2000, but the couple divorced four years later. Her marriage to American mobile phone accessory entrepreneur Damian Gabrielle took place in 2006, but ended in divorce in late 2007. She moved to London in 2009.
Kurylenko is a philanthropist noted for her work for the underprivileged, focusing on children in her native Ukraine.
Filmography
Notes
References
External links
- Olga Kurylenko at the Internet Movie Database
- Olga Kurylenko on Twitter
- Olga Kurylenko at AllMovie
- Olga Kurylenko at the Fashion Model Directory
