Biografía

After playing in Ridley Scott's Red de Mentiras (2008), she was banned from leaving her home country Iran in February 2008 on her way to London to make a screen test for El príncipe de Persia - Las arenas del tiempo (2010). The role she was set to audition for eventually went to English actress Gemma Arterton. This was only reported six months later when she actually could leave the country. She now lives in Paris, France.

Fluent in English, French, and Farsi. Some knowledge of Arabic and Kurdish.

First Iranian star after the 1979 revolution to play in a major Hollywood production: Ridley Scott's Red de Mentiras (2008) with Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe.

Her underground rock band "Kooch" got the first prize at the 2nd Tehran Avenue Underground Rock Festival in 2003. Rock music and women singing are banned in Iran.

In Santouri (2007), Golshifteh plays the piano herself.

I think there is a problem in France that anyone who is not European, you want to know where they come from and why do they come from somewhere or why they speak English or why they are human. That's the big barrier for all of us that are coming from some far, far away countries. But at the end of the day, we are all artists.

I have scars from every film I have made. There is nothing to protect actors. They treat you worse than a dog. You work like a slave, and you know, I like it. That is the way it should be. Every film should be like your last.

Exile is my power.

The Iran I'm dreaming of maybe doesn't exist anymore.

I had to tell people I was not born with a scarf because I came out of Iran. People think you came out of your mother with a scarf; they can't imagine that the scarf is not stuck to your head.