Top 10 Fascinating Facts about Léa Seydoux

Léa Seydoux in the première of the film “La Belle Et La Bete”. Photo by Susanne Erler. Wikimedia Commons

Top 10 Fascinating Facts about Léa Seydoux

Léa Hélène Seydoux is a French actor. Her acting career began in a French cinema. She appeared in films such as The Last Mistress and On War. Seydoux first came to attention after she won the Trophée Chopard and received her first César Award nomination, for her performance in The Beautiful Person.

Seydoux has appeared in a number of major Hollywood films since then.  In French cinema, she was nominated for the César Award for Most Promising Actress a second time for her role in Belle Épine and for Best Actress for her role as Marie Antoinette’s lady-in-waiting in the film Farewell, My Queen.

Seydoux rose to prominence in 2013. She won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for her performance as a lesbian art student.

That same year, she won the Lumières Award for Best Actress for her work in Grand Central. In 2014, she was nominated for a BAFTA Rising Star Award for her work in Beauty and the Beast. She gained international attention for her role as Bond girl Madeleine Swann in Spectre .

1. Léa Seydoux, wanted to become an opera singer

Seydoux wanted to be an opera singer as a child and studied music at the Conservatoire de Paris. She did, however, have artistic ambitions.

Clearly, her desire to perform as a child was strong. As a child, she was always singing and performing in front of her parents.

She had no idea she wanted to be an actress. Her shyness forced her to abandon the dream.

2. Léa Seydoux learned English by attending summer camp in the US

Léa Seydoux. Photo by Nicolas Genin. Wikimedia Commons

Seydoux is a native of France, and her first language has always been French. However, the actress speaks English fairly well. This is because her father sent her to a sleep away camp in the United States for six summers in a row. This came in handy when she made her Hollywood debut.

3. Love led Seydoux to act

Although acting was not her first career choice, she met an actor and instantly fell in love with him. Seydoux would see all of his plays and movies.

She decided to pursue a career as an actress in order to impress him. Seydoux studied acting at the French drama school Les Enfants Terribles, and continued her studies with Corinne Blue at New York’s Actors Studio in 2007.

4. Léa Seydoux got her start in the mid 2000s

Léa Sedoux giving a masterclass at Ecal. Photo by Pierre Vogel. Wikimedia Commons

Lea Seydoux debuted in French cinema in the mid-2000s. Her first major screen role being girlfriends, followed by the consolation in 2007. Her breakthrough role came in 2008 The Beautiful Person. It earned her the 2009 Chopard award for best upcoming actress at the Cannes Film Festival.

She achieved worldwide acclaim for her role in the critically acclaimed blue is the warmest color. She received critical acclaim and was awarded the palm door at Khan in 2013. Seydox was also nominated for the Bafta Rising Star Award and the Cesar Award for Best Actress the same year.

5. Léa Seydoux received a César Award nomination

Léa Seydoux. Photo by Nicolas Genin. Wikimedia Commons

In 2013, Seydoux received a César Award nomination for Best Actress for her role as Sidonie Laborde in Benoît Jacquot’s Farewell, My Queen.

Later that year, Blue Is the Warmest Color won the Palme d’Or at Cannes, and the jury, made the unusual decision to award the prize not only to the director, but also to the film’s two stars, Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos. 

6. Seydoux comes from a well known family in France

Several members of Seydoux’s family are well-known film industry figures. Her father, Henri Seydoux, is the CEO of the French drone company Parrot. Valérie Schlumberger, her mother, is a former actress turned philanthropist.

Her grandfather, Jérôme Seydoux, is the chairman of the Pathé cinema company. Both of her grand-uncles, are the chairmen of the Gaumont Film Company and the Lille OSC.

7. Léa Seydoux has modeled

Léa Seydoux obviously has a successful acting career, but that is not her only accomplishment. She has modeled for years, appearing in photo shoots for magazines such as Vogue Paris, Lafisielle, and others, but she has stated that she does not consider herself a model.

8. Léa Seydoux has been in adverts

Seydoux has  appeared in the Levi’s television commercial “Dangerous Liaison” and has in photo editorials for Vogue Paris, American Vogue, Numéro, L’Officiel, CRASH, Another Magazine, and W magazine. She was the face of Didier Dubot’s 2013 campaign and appeared in Rag & Bone’s Fall 2013 campaign alongside Michael Pitt. 

She also posed naked for the French men’s magazine Lui.

 Seydoux and Blue Is the Warmest Color co-star Adèle Exarchopoulos were also featured in Miu Miu’s 2014 resort ad campaign.

Seydoux was the face of Prada’s 2012 Resort line, as well as the fragrances.

She has been a Louis Vuitton brand ambassador since 2016.

9. Léa Seydoux features in a video game

Hideo Kojima’s video game Death Stranding stars Seydoux. She provided the character Fragile, the head of Fragile Express, with her voice, performance, and likeness. 

Death Stranding was released in November 2019 to positive reviews, with critics describing her as a “marvel” and her performance as the “most nuanced performance capture ever seen in the medium.”

10. Léa Seydoux has worked on two different movies at once

Léa Seydoux. Photo by Nicolas Genin. Wikimedia Commons

Lea Seydoux is clearly in high demand in Hollywood in 2015. The actress juggled filming two projects at the same time.

She had also been filming specter while the James Bond film was shot in London, England, it’s only the end of the world that was shot in Montreal, Canada on occasion. She only had 24 hours to cross the Atlantic to do some filming.

Lea Seydoux played a young woman who she described as a “very afraid, angry, and hysterical inspector” to the Independent. Lea Seydoux played the complex new Bond girl Madeleine Swann, which required the actors to not only juggle two different film shoots in two different locations, but also two very different parts.