Leïla Bekhti

Biography

Leïla Bekhti (ليلى بختي) is a French-Algerian actress, born on March 6, 1984, in Issy-les-Moulineaux. She notably received the César Award for Most Promising Actress in 2011 for her role in Tout Ce Qui Brille. In 2010, Leïla Bekhti married actor Tahar Rahim, whom she met in 2007 on the set of the film A Prophet.

Leïla Bekhti was born into an Algerian family from Sidi Bel Abbès in western Algeria, who settled in the Paris region. Born in Issy-les-Moulineaux, Leïla Bekhti grew up in Bagneux. She is the youngest of three children. While a high school student, she regularly bought Casting magazine, with the sole intention of having fun looking for ads that might be of interest to her, without taking any action each time they did. After obtaining a literary baccalaureate (with a theater option) from the Maurice-Genevoix high school in Montrouge, she reluctantly enrolled in a university and took an art therapy course there.[4] She also attended a theater school in Paris for six months, without much regular attendance. While working various odd jobs—including as a saleswoman in a clothing store owned by her brother in Orléans—to pay for her classes, she then enrolled at the Stéphane-Gildas school in Paris, then Bérengère Basty's class at the Art'aire Studio. In 2005, encouraged by friends, she went to the casting of Sheitan, a film by Kim Chapiron with Vincent Cassel (also the film's producer), and obtained one of the main roles, that of Yasmine, a young woman with no fears. Leïla Bekhti then played in the TV film Harkis with Smaïn and rediscovered the history of Algeria, the country where her family comes from. We find Leïla Bekhti in Paris, Je T’Aime then in Roschdy Zem's first film Mauvaise Foi. Then, her friend Géraldine Nakache offered her the main role alongside her in Tout Ce Qui Brille, a real box-office success, which earned her a César for Most Promising Actress. In 2011, she played in Toi, Moi, Les autres and Itinéraire Bis. After La Source Des Femmes, Leïla Bekhti returned to the screen in A Better Life with Guillaume Canet in January 2012. This was followed by more than fifty films and as many notable roles, in both drama and comedy, for film and television (see filmography).

In her private life, Leila Bekhti met actor Tahar Rahim on the set of Jacques Audiard's film A Prophet, released in 2009. They married discreetly in 2010 and went on to have five children.