Foto: Gage Skidmore
Oscar Isaac Hernández Estrada (born March 9, 1979) is a Guatemalan-born American actor. Known for his versatility, he has been credited with breaking stereotypes about Latino characters in Hollywood. He was named the best actor of his generation by Vanity Fair in 2017 and one of the 25 greatest actors of the 21st century by The New York Times in 2020. His accolades include a Golden Globe Award, a National Board of Review Award and a nomination for a Primetime Emmy Award. In 2016, he featured on Time's list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
When Isaac was an infant, he moved with his family to the United States. As a teenager, he joined a punk band, acted in plays and made his film debut in a minor role. An alumnus of the Juilliard School, Isaac was a character actor in films for much of the 2000s. His first major role was that of Joseph in the biblical drama The Nativity Story (2006), and he won an AACTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for portraying East Timorese political leader José Ramos-Horta in the Australian film Balibo (2009). After gaining recognition for playing supporting parts in Robin Hood (2010) and Drive (2011), Isaac had his breakthrough with the eponymous role of a singer in the musical drama Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), which earned him a Golden Globe nomination.
Isaac’s career progressed with leading roles in the crime drama A Most Violent Year (2014), the thriller Ex Machina (2015) and the superhero film X-Men: Apocalypse (2016). He became a global star with the role of Poe Dameron in the Star Wars sequel trilogy (2015–2019). Isaac starred in the historical drama Operation Finale (2018) – which marked his first venture into production—the science fiction films Annihilation (2018) and Dune (2021), and the crime drama The Card Counter (2021). On television, he was the lead in three miniseries: Show Me a Hero (2015), for which he won a Golden Globe Award, Scenes from a Marriage (2021), and the Marvel Cinematic Universe's Moon Knight (2022). His stage work includes title roles in Romeo and Juliet (2007) and Hamlet (2017).
Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada was born on March 9, 1979, in Guatemala City to a Guatemalan mother, María Eugenia Estrada Nicolle, and a Cuban father, Óscar Gonzalo Hernández-Cano, a pulmonologist. He has an older sister, climate scientist Nicole, and a younger brother, journalist Mike. Isaac’s family immigrated to the US when he was five months old, and they frequently moved around the country, living in Baltimore, New Orleans, and Miami, where they eventually settled. Isaac became a United States citizen in 2006. He has French origins through his grandfather and describes himself as “a big mix of many things”. He speaks English and Spanish.
Unsure about his career choice, Isaac considered enlisting in the Marines at one point. His father initially disapproved of this, but Isaac had recruiters convince him. Once he had taken the exam, Isaac said he wanted to do combat photography in the military reserve, a job they did not offer. Instead, he studied performing arts at Miami Dade College and continued to act in plays. During a trip to New York City to play a young Fidel Castro in an Off-Broadway production of the play When it's Cocktail Time in Cuba, he successfully auditioned to study at the Juilliard School. While a student there, he was cast in a production of Macbeth and worked on the film All About the Benjamins (2002). Isaac graduated from Juilliard with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 2005.
After Isaac finished filming Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker in October 2018, he intended to take a prolonged acting hiatus but was cast as Duke Leto Atreides in Dune (2021) a few months later. In the former, the final film in the Star Wars sequel trilogy, Isaac reprised the role of Poe Dameron. It received mixed reviews but was profitable. Earlier in 2019, Isaac starred as an agent working against a drug cartel in South America in J. C. Chandor's Netflix film Triple Frontier. To avoid feeling exhausted during scenes in which he is running at high altitude, Isaac trained in a New York Hall where one can decrease oxygen. He said that filming in a favela with no water or sewage made him realize his privileged life. Reviews for the film were generally positive. Isaac next voiced the role of Gomez Addams in The Addams Family (2019), a computer-animated film based on the titular characters created by Charles Addams. For years, fans suggested Isaac be cast in the part as they claimed he resembled Raul Julia who played Gomez Addams in live-action films in the 1990s. The Addams Family received mixed reviews and grossed $203 million on a $24 million budget.
Isaac’s only role in 2020 was as a kindhearted prison officer in the short film The Letter Room, for which he was also an executive producer. Roktim Rajpal of the Deccan Herald believed that Isaac “is the backbone of the short and makes an impact with his sincere performance”, yet he fails to “internali[z]e the character as much as expected”. The following year, he starred alongside Jessica Chastain in Scenes from a Marriage. A remake of the 1973 Swedish series of the same name by Ingmar Bergman, it switches gender roles, and explores the themes of monogamy, marriage and divorce.
Isaac will star in and produce The Great Machine, an adaptation of the comic Ex Machina. He is set to star in London, which will be directed by Ben Stiller. In December 2020, it was announced that Isaac would star as Solid Snake in the film adaptation of Metal Gear Solid directed by Jordan Vogt-Roberts. In October 2021, he was cast in Martin McDonagh's untitled project; it co-starred Christopher Walken and Sam Rockwell.
In 2023, Isaac is set to star in the revival of Lorraine Hansberry’s The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window opposite Rachel Brosnahan at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
