Léa Hélène Seydoux-Fornier de Clausonne (born 1 July 1985) is a French actress who has appeared in both French cinema and Hollywood productions. She has been nominated for five César Awards, two Lumière Awards, a Palme d'Or and a BAFTA Award. In 2009, she won the Trophée Chopard Award for Female Revelation of the Year at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2016, she was honoured with appointment as a Dame of the Order of Arts and Letters. In 2022, the French government made her a Dame of the National Order of Merit. In 2026, the Académie des César announced that she will be the president of the 52nd César Awards ceremony, to be held on February 25, 2027.
She began her acting career with her film debut in Girlfriends (2006), with early roles in The Last Mistress (2007) and On War (2008). She won acclaim for her French roles in The Beautiful Person (2008), Belle Épine (2010), and Farewell, My Queen (2012). During this time, she expanded her career appearing in supporting roles in high-profile Hollywood films, including Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds (2009), Ridley Scott's Robin Hood (2010), Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris (2011) and the action film Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011).
Her breakthrough role came with the controversial and acclaimed film Blue Is the Warmest Colour (2013) for which she received the Lumière Award for Best Actress, as well as the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival along with her co-star Adèle Exarchopoulos and director Abdellatif Kechiche. She received her second Lumière Award within the same year for the film Grand Central. She gained international attention for her role as Bond girl Madeleine Swann in Spectre (2015), and No Time to Die (2021).
She has appeared in the Wes Anderson films The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) and The French Dispatch (2021). Other notable roles include Beauty and the Beast (2014), Saint Laurent (2014), The Lobster (2015), Zoe (2018), France (2021), Crimes of the Future (2022), One Fine Morning (2022), The Beast (2023), Dune: Part Two (2024), and the video games Death Stranding (2019) and Death Stranding 2: On the Beach (2025).
Seydoux has also worked as a model. She has been showcased in Vogue Paris, American Vogue, L'Officiel, Another Magazine and W magazine, among others. Since 2016, she has been a brand ambassador for Louis Vuitton.
Léa Hélène Seydoux-Fornier de Clausonne was born on 1 July 1985, in Passy, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, to parents of partly Alsatian heritage. Her father, Henri Jérôme Seydoux-Fornier de Clausonne, is the founder and CEO of the French wireless company Parrot. Her mother, Valérie Schlumberger, is a philanthropist and former actress who has founded several charitable organisations, including a centre for homeless children in Senegal. Seydoux is one of seven children; her siblings and half-siblings include the stylist Camille Seydoux.
The Seydoux family is widely known in France and is influential in the film industry. Seydoux's grandfather, Jérôme Seydoux, is the chairman of the production company Pathé; her great-uncle, Nicolas Seydoux, is the chairman of the film studio Gaumont; and her other great-uncle, Michel Seydoux, is a film producer and was the former chairman of the football club Lille OSC. Seydoux's godfather is the footwear designer Christian Louboutin. In 2013, responding to suggestions that her family connections helped her career, Seydoux said her family "never lifted a finger" to help her, and that she never asked for their assistance. She said her grandfather had no interest in her acting career.
Seydoux grew up in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. Her parents divorced when she was three years old and often traveled for work, which left the young Seydoux feeling "very lonely" and like an orphan; she also felt like a "misfit" during her youth. Seydoux had a "strict" Protestant upbringing, but stated in 2011 that she is not religious. As a child, she wanted to be an opera singer and studied music at the Conservatoire de Paris. However, she abandoned singing because she found it too difficult, and because she was a shy child. For six years, Seydoux went to summer camp in Maryland, United States, at the behest of her father, who wanted her to learn English.
At age 18, Seydoux decided to become an actress. One of her close friends was an actor, and Seydoux has said: "I found his life wonderful ... you can travel, you're free, you can do what you want, you're the boss.'" She fell in love with an actor and decided to become an actress to impress him. Years later, Seydoux revealed that this actor was her longtime friend, Louis Garrel. She took acting classes at the French drama school Les Enfants Terribles, having Jean-Bernard Feitussi as her close friend and mentor, and in 2007 she took further training at New York's Actors Studio with Corinne Blue.
In 2005, Seydoux appeared in the music video for Raphaël's single "Ne partons pas fâchés". The following year, she appeared in an award-winning ad for Levi’s jeans. Her first major screen role was in the 2006 French-Belgian comedy film Girlfriends. Seydoux then starred in Nicolas Klotz's short film La Consolation, which was shown at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.
In these years, she also did her first work as a model for American Apparel, posing for their Pantytime campaign, and had a role in the films 13 French Street and The Last Mistress.
2008–2012: French cinema and Hollywood expansion
Seydoux came to widespread attention in 2008, when she appeared in Christophe Honoré's The Beautiful Person, a role that earned her the 2009 Chopard Award at the Cannes Film Festival for Best Upcoming Actress and a César Award nomination for Most Promising Actress.
In 2009, she had a major part in Jessica Hausner's Lourdes, and a small role in her first Hollywood film, Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds. In 2010, she starred alongside Russell Crowe in Ridley Scott's Robin Hood, playing Isabella of Angoulême. That same year, she appeared in Louis Garrel's short-film Petit Tailleur, Rebecca Zlotowski's Belle Épine, which earned her a second César Award nomination for Most Promising Actress, and Raúl Ruiz's Mysteries of Lisbon. Seydoux auditioned and was one of the four finalists, to play Lisbeth Salander in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but the part ultimately went to actress Rooney Mara. Seydoux recalled in an interview: "I got upset, but I don't think I'd be able to do anything to get that part. It was totally against my nature. I worked hard, but Lisbeth was almost anorexic. I wasn't like that".
Seydoux admitted to having had an anxiety crisis during the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, saying: 'I'll never be Sophie Marceau, I'm too weird'. Later, she stated: "In the middle of the Cannes hysteria, I felt fragile and vulnerable. I made this comparison because I'll never be France's "petite fiancée". Sophie Marceau represents anything, while I don't have a definite place.
In 2011, she played Gabrielle in the romantic comedy Midnight in Paris. Later, Seydoux participated in another Hollywood production, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, in which she played the assassin Sabine Moreau alongside stars Tom Cruise and Jeremy Renner. She also played Elle in the short-film Time Doesn't Stand Still by Benjamin Millepied and Asa Mader. After Mission: Impossible, Seydoux returned to French cinema, starring in My Wife's Romance (Le Roman de ma femme) and Roses à crédit.
More generally, Léa Seydoux's career accelerated from 2012 and allowed the actress to choose her projects from the offers she received, without necessarily having to go through screen tests. According to the specialist press, the young woman then appeared as one of the "essential French actresses in Hollywood", and even as "the most sought-after actress of her generation", who at only 26 years-old, "has always made the right choices and has tackled almost all genres". In the process, she became the image of the perfume Candy for the Italian luxury group Prada.