Academy Award® nominee SALMA HAYEK has proven herself as a prolific actress, producer and director in both film and television. She received an Academy Award® nomination, a Golden Globe nomination, a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination and a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress for her work as Frida Kahlo in Julie Taymor's Frida.
Hayek won a Daytime Emmy for her directorial debut, The Maldonado Miracle, which she also produced. The film, which starred Peter Fonda, Mare Winningham and Rubén Blades, premiered at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival and later aired on Showtime. She has also directed music videos for both Prince and Jada Pinkett Smith.
Hayek's other film credits include Alex de la Iglesia's La chispa de la vida; Mathieu Demy's Americano; the Academy Award®-nominated Puss in Boots, with Antonio Banderas; Columbia Pictures' Grown Ups, alongside Adam Sandler, Kevin James and Chris Rock; Paul Weitz's Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant, released by Universal Pictures; Todd Robinson's Lonely Hearts, opposite John Travolta and James Gandolfini; Robert Towne's Ask the Dust, alongside Colin Farrell and Idina Menzel; Bandidas, opposite Penélope Cruz; Brett Ratner's After the Sunset; Robert Rodriguez's Once Upon a Time in Mexico; Mike Figgis' Hotel and Timecode; Kevin Smith's Dogma; From Dusk Till Dawn, directed by Robert Rodriquez and written by Quentin Tarantino; and Robert Rodriguez's Desperado.
Since 2006, Hayek and her producing partner, José Tamez, have been developing, producing and acquiring mainstream projects that either draw on Latin themes or feature Latin talent, both in front of and behind the camera for ABC Studios. She served as the executive producer on ABC's award-winning program Ugly Betty, starring America Ferrera and based on the enormously successful Colombian series Yo soy Betty, la fea. In 2001, she starred in and co-produced Showtime's In the Time of the Butterflies, for which she was nominated for a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award. Also produced by Hayek's Ventanarosa Productions was the Mexican feature No One Writes to the Colonel, directed by Arturo Ripstein and based on the novel by Gabriel García Marquez. The film was selected for official competition at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival.
Born and raised in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico, Hayek studied international relations in college in Mexico. Her additional Mexican credits include Midaq Alley, based on a novel by Nobel Prize winner Naguib Mahfouz.
Noted for her acting career, Hayek has also dedicated much of her time to social activism. She served as spokesperson for the Pampers/UNICEF partnership worldwide to help stop the spread of life-threatening maternal and neonatal tetanus. She also served as the spokesperson for the Avon Foundation's Speak Out Against Domestic Violence program, which focuses on domestic violence education, awareness and prevention, as well as support for victims. In 2005, she spoke in front of the U.S. Senate, encouraging its members to extend the Violence Against Women Act. In April 2005, Hayek visited the Arctic Circle for the celebration of Earth Day in an effort to bring attention to the dangers that global warming is putting on the lives of the Inuit people and the rest of the world. In November 2005, she served as co-host, alongside Julianne Moore, at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, which honored Nobel laureate Mohamed ElBaradei and the United Nation's International Atomic Energy Agency. She was also part of the ONE campaign, which singer and activist Bono created, and was a member of Global Green and YouthAIDS.
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