When a film takes home the coveted Palme d’Or prize at Cannes Film Festival, naturally, the world pays attention. Take Sean Baker’s Anora, which not only premiered at the festival earlier this year to glowing reviews, but also took home the top accolade. While there’s still a little time to wait before it hits our screens, there’s plenty we can hyper-fixate on until then. Our current obsession? Mikey Madison, Anora’s lead.
The 25-year-old actress went from relative obscurity to firmly on our radars with her star-making turn as Ani, a sex worker whose life takes a turn when she meets a powerful Russian man, and the pair move to New York together. So who is the actress behind the fanfare? Below, everything we know about Mikey Madison.
Who is Mikey Madison?
Originally from Los Angeles, Madison was born in 1999 to two psychologist parents, and grew up with a twin brother, and three other siblings. While, professionally, she goes by Mikey, Madison's real name is Mikaela Madison Rosberg. As a child, she pursued competitive horse riding but, at 14, made a fateful career switch to acting.
What else has Mikey Madison appeared in?
While Anora will no doubt make Madison a star, you might already recognise her from her previous work. Madison has been acting professionally since 2016, when she began a four-year run as Max Fox in the comedy-drama, Better Things. In 2019, she landed a role as a Manson family member in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood and, in 2024, she starred alongside Natalie Portman in the miniseries Lady In The Lake.
But it was her role in Scream back in 2022 that really set the wheels of Madison's career in motion. Shortly after the thriller premiered, Anora director Sean Baker requested to meet with her, and set out writing the script for Anora — on the condition that Madison agreed to take the lead role.
She's also a sartorial star-in-the-making
Like many budding starlets of the current generation, Madison has a killer wardrobe to match her stellar career. While the actress doesn't have any public social media profiles, we're often given glimpses into her looks, courtesy of stylist Jamie Mizrahi (whose clientele includes Jennifer Lawrence, Cooper Koch, and Riley Keough, to name a few). Together, the duo are adept at devising 'fits courtesy of luxury labels like Celine, Schiaparelli, Louis Vuitton, and Loewe, making our excitement for new looks on the Anora press tour almost as high as it is to see the film itself. Don't believe us? Below, get acquainted with Madison's sartorial savvy, with our pick of her best looks (so far).
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