Bardem was born on Mar. 1, 1969 in Las Palmas, Canary Islands, Spain, the son of Carlos Encinas and the actress Pilar Bardem. Bardem comes from a long line of filmmakers and actors who have been working since the earliest days of Spanish cinema; he is the grandson of actors Rafael Bardem and Matilde Muñoz Sampedro, and the nephew of screenwriter and director Juan Antonio Bardem. Both his older Read more...

Bardem starred in his second major motion picture, The Ages of Lulu, when he was 20. In 1992, he made his first international hit with Jamón, Jamón, which also starred Penélope Cruz. After starring in roughly two dozen films in his native country, he would eventually land his international breakthrough performance role in Julian Schnabel's Before Night Falls in 2000, as Cuban poet Reinaldo Read more...

Bardem does not know how to drive and consistently refers to himself as a "worker" and not an actor. Following the legalization of same-sex marriage in Spain in 2005, Bardem incited controversy when he stated that if he were gay, he would "get married tomorrow, just to fuck the church" (mañana mismo, sólo para joder a la Iglesia). Bardem's life's work was recently honored at the 2007 Gotham Read more...