Eva Gaëlle Green born July 5, 1980 in Paris, France is a BAFTA award-winning French actress who has starred in such film as The Dreamers, Kingdom of Heaven, and Casino Royale.She has said that she comes from a "bourgeois" family, and was raised in the 17th arrondissement of Paris. Green attended the American School of Paris for her formal years. She has one sibling, a fraternal twin sister, Joy, from whom she is reportedly estranged. Green's name is pronounced /greːn/, (approximately rhyming with "wren") in Swedish; it comes from the Swedish word gren, which means (tree) branch. She studied acting in Paris for three years, followed by a ten-week polishing course at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London, England.

Green began her professional career in 2001, when she performed in the play Jalousie En Trois Fax, playing the role of Iris – a performance that brought her critical acclaim and a nomination for Les Molières in the category Révélation Théâtrale Féminine. In 2002, she made her second stage appearance as the coquette in the play Turcaret. In 2003, Green made her feature film debut in Bernardo Bertolucci's film The Dreamers with Michael Pitt and Louis Garrel. She played the role of Isabelle. Described by Bertolucci as "so beautiful it's indecent", her performance brought her critical acclaim, as well as some notoriety for her extensive full frontal nudity. While filming The Dreamers, Green was said to have found Bertolucci manipulative, though in a creative way that wasn't pushy.[citation needed] In comparison to her previous stage acting, she has said that acting in front of the camera makes you its "plaything". During filming, Green's hair accidentally caught fire on a candle and because she acted so calmly about it, the director decided to leave it in.