She was only 13 years old when her life changed. Until then, Mia Goth (London, 30 years old) had not exactly had a quiet existence, but when she was barely a teenager and a photographer encouraged her to be a model, she already sensed that her life would not be like that of her classmates. She even starred in some campaigns with Cara Delevingne, the most coveted model of those years, before her career was redirected towards acting thanks to Lars Von Trier. The Danish director counted on Goth for the second installment of Nymphomaniac (2013), possibly one of the most controversial films by one of the most controversial directors of his generation. That debut on the big screen caught the attention of critics and, since then, this British actress but with Brazilian and Canadian blood has demonstrated her ability to embody characters with great dramatic charge, although after several prominent roles in horror films for many she is, without a doubt, the ultimate scream queen. Her latest project, the film MaXXXinethe third part of a saga that began in 2022 with the acclaimed X, has revalidated his title in this genre.
Born to a Canadian father and a Brazilian mother, Mia Gypsy Mello da Silva Goth was born in the United Kingdom. When she was a few weeks old, she and her mother moved to Brazil, where she spent long periods of time with her grandmother, the Brazilian actress Maria Gladys. “I grew up with my grandmother in Brazil for a while and saw first-hand how [cuando eres actriz] Good is very good but bad can be really, really bad. I saw her suffer and I think that affected me in some way.” explained in W Magazine in 2023 referring to her grandmother’s profession and how it may have influenced her decision to dedicate herself to the seventh art.
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Her days on Copacabana beach with her Brazilian family soon came to an end, and at the age of five she moved to the UK and soon after settled in Canada, where her father lives. “When I was 10, I went to seven schools in one year in Nova Scotia. My mother and I moved there to be closer to my father,” she revealed years ago. That unstable childhood became somewhat calmer when at 12 she moved permanently to Catford, in south-east London. There she spent her adolescence obsessed with Amy Winehouse (she even went camping in front of her house) and earning her first salaries as a model. “I did auditions for luxury brands but it never really worked out (…) The fashion world has been more open to me since I became an actress,” she once said. And she was right.
At the age of 18, she had already exchanged fashion for cinema and was working under the orders of Lars von Trier in the second part of Nymphomaniacwhere he gave life to P in a small role that allowed her to share the screen with Charlotte Gainsbourg. The explicit sex scenes were not an obstacle for the young Goth, who later admitted that perhaps her naivety prevented her from being scared and thinking too much about what lay ahead. The film, without being a box office hit, placed her as one of the actresses of the moment and that, added to her past as a model, caught the attention of the fashion industry.
In 2015, she was photographed by Steven Meisel for Miu Miu’s autumn/winter campaign. In the images, she appeared lying on a bed wearing clothes from the brand in a pose that many considered inappropriate, which led to the withdrawal of the campaign. Critics pointed out the sexualization of the images, pointing out that Goth was a child, despite being 22 years old at the time. That childlike and somewhat candid face works as a powerful counterpoint to the dark thoughts and complex personalities of the characters she brings to life.
Engage in Nymphomaniac It was not only a turning point for her career, but also for her personal life. In the film she worked with Willem Dafoe and Shia LaBeouf, who later became her partner. LaBeouf was the boy of the moment after his participation in the successful Transformers and their relationship did not go unnoticed by the paparazzi. The couple dealt with that media interest and even fueled it on occasion, for example when in 2016 they married in Las Vegas with an Elvis impersonator in a ceremony broadcast by the gossip portal TMZ.
More than a decade after convincing critics with his first film, Goth’s filmography is growing slowly but surely. He doesn’t chain filming after filming, his projects seem carefully chosen and, whether by chance or because he has really been pigeonholed into a type of character accustomed to suffering and having a bad time, many of these titles belong to horror films. If in 2016 he starred in The cure for well-beingunder the orders of the director of The Ring Gore Verbinski, in 2017, was part of the horror film The Secret of Marrowboneby the Spanish Sergio G. Sánchez. These two forays into the genre were enough for Luca Guadagnino to want to count on her for Sighshe remake from the Italian psychological horror film directed by Dario Argento in 1977.
Shia LaBeouf and Mia Goth on one of the few occasions in which they were seen together publicly, in 2014. Fred Duval (FilmMagic)With some supporting roles in films such as Emmathe adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel of the same name, Mia Goth has kept a low profile for several years, usually with the critics in her favour but closer to independent cinema than to Hollywood blockbusters. Even so, keeping her personal life on the low plane has cost her special effort. “I would never want to share that part of my life. Why do it? For what?” she said recently. The comings and goings of her relationship with Shia LaBeouf, from whom she separated in 2018 to reconcile in 2020 and have their first child together in 2022, have led her to constantly make headlines in the tabloid press.
Screenwriter, producer and protagonist
The same year her daughter was born she participated in Xthe movie slasher which has relaunched her career with force. In the project, directed and written by Ti West and backed by the prestigious independent film production company A24, she plays two characters: Pearl, a decrepit-looking old woman, and Maxine, a young adult film actress eager for fame. The synopsis of the film, set in the seventies, revolves around a group of friends who go to an old farm in Texas to film an adult film. The sinister elderly couple who own the farm do not look kindly on these intentions and a bloodbath breaks out.
Filming was particularly intense for Goth due to the long hours of makeup required by the prosthetics with which she became the elderly Pearl, to which she then had to add the days of recording. Six months after the premiere of Xthe prequel centered on Pearl’s story has hit theaters, a work for which Goth received an avalanche of nominations and awards on the independent film and horror film festival circuit, including Best Actress at the 2022 Sitges Film Festival (in the same edition, Ti West won Best Director). The actress, who joined the filming shortly after giving birth, co-wrote the script with Ti West.
Mia Goth, in a frame from the movie ‘X’ (2022).IMDB“There was a time when it was a miracle for me to get a job. Pearl has changed me in the sense of how I see myself and my ability as an actor. That film was an opportunity to experience character-driven acting for the first time, there is little plot, everything revolves around the character,” she said in a statement. Vanity Fair.
Fans of the saga have not had to wait too long to enjoy a new installment, in principle the closing of the trilogy. It was released in Spain on August 23 MaXXXinesequel to X. This time it is set in the eighties and features Maxine, a survivor of the murders of Xtrying to make it big in Los Angeles. Kevin Bacon, Lily Collins and Elizabeth Debicki are some of the new names in the cast. Goth has acted as a producer and thanks to this she has been able to influence several key decisions, such as the choice of the cast: “This time I didn’t participate in the script. It was all Ti [West, el director]. But I have been able to contribute more on the castingwe made a brainstorming with names of possible actors who could fit each character. It was an exciting process,” told in The New York Times. In addition, this time she refused to show her chest, considering it unnecessary for the story. “I didn’t want to do it (…) that doesn’t mean I won’t do it again, it just wasn’t the time,” sentenced in the magazine Time weeks ago. The film enjoyed a strong box office debut in the United States at the beginning of the summer.
Fortunately for Goth, the good results have overshadowed a controversy that directly implicates her. One of the film’s extras has denounced her, claiming that she kicked him in the head intentionally and spoke to him in disrespectful terms. She has avoided commenting on the case, currently awaiting trial, although the production company A24 has shown its support. Whatever the case, for some experts MaXXXine It is the finale to one of the best horror trilogies of all time and with this good reception it will be difficult to imagine Mia Goth in any other type of role. “Sometimes I say to myself, ‘No, I’m not going to do another horror movie. I’m going to wait for something else to come out.’ And then I end up reading a script and it turns out to be a genre film, but it’s an extraordinary role and I think: ‘How can I let someone else do it?’” He was sincere in Collider.
Still, she doesn’t want to be just one scream queen and has made it clear on many occasions. “I don’t want to label myself. I want to do everything,” she said during the promotion of MaXXXine. For now, Guillermo del Toro is counting on her Frankensteina free adaptation in which she will play the girlfriend of the monster, played by Jacob Elordi. The expectation generated by the new film by the Mexican filmmaker is no less than that aroused by Bladehe remake Marvel’s latest film about the most famous vampire hunter. The film has suffered several delays but Goth is confirmed in the role of Lilith, the daughter of Dracula and enemy of Blade (played by Oscar winner Mahershala Ali). Whether as the girlfriend of a laboratory monster or as a blood-sucking villain, fantasy and horror continue to surround Goth. “I would like to do a romantic comedy. I have been very focused on this spectrum of violence and gore but I like love too,” she recently confessed. Someone take note.
