María Valverde

Born and raised in Madrid, Valverde always knew she would become an actress. She got her break in 2002 when she was cast by Manuel Martín Cuenca for the leading role in La Flaqueza del Bolchevique (The Bolshevik's Weakness; 2003). At 15, it was Valverde's first feature film. That same year, she was awarded the Goya for Best New Actress, the most important prize awarded by the Film Academy in Spain.

Valverde followed with: Fuera del Cuerpo (Out of Body) and Vorvik, and quickly began attracting the attention of the international film community. She next made Melissa P (2005) for Italian director, Luca Guadagnino, adapted from Melissa Panarello's international best- seller.

Returning home, Valverde made The Borgia; Thieves; El Rey de la Montaña (The King of the Mountain), El Hombre de Arena (The Sandman) and La Mujer del Anarquista (The Anarchist's Wife), before working for director Jordan Scott (daughter of Ridley Scott) in Cracks.

Back in Madrid, Valverde was then cast in the leading role in the love story Tres Metros Sobre el Cielo (Three Steps Above Heaven) and followed with Madrid, 1987 (David Trueba, 2011) with José Sacristán. That same year, Valverde also marked her television debut with a leading role in the Telecinco series, La Fuga.

With ten-years of experience to her credit and working alongside with international actors like Nick Nolte, Eva Green and Geraldine Chaplin, Valverde starred in Libertador: The Liberator in which she plays Simón Bolívar's wife, Maria Teresa del Toro. She starred in La Mula (The Mule), A Puerta Fría (Cold Call), screened at the Málaga Film Festival in 2012, and in Broken Horses (2012) for director Vidhu Vinod Chopra.

Cohen Media Group