Scarlett Johansson (American Actress)
Scarlett Ingrid Johansson (/dʒoʊˈhænsən/; born November 22, 1984) is an American actress. The world’s highest-paid actress in 2018 and 2019, she has been featured multiple times on the Forbes Celebrity 100 list.
Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2021. Johansson’s films have grossed over $15.4 billion worldwide, making her the highest-grossing box office female star of all time.
She has received various accolades, including a British Academy Film Award, a Tony Award, and nominations for two Academy Awards and five Golden Globe Awards.
|
Scarlett Johansson
|
|
|---|---|
Scarlett Johansson in 2019
|
|
| Born |
Scarlett Ingrid Johansson
November 22, 1984 New York City, U.S.
|
| Citizenship |
|
| Occupations |
|
| Years active | 1994–present |
| Works |
|
| Spouses |
|
| Children | 2 |
| Relatives | Ejner Johansson (grandfather) |
| Signature | |
 |
|
Scarlett Johansson first appeared on stage in an off-Broadway play as a child actress. She made her film debut in the fantasy comedy North (1994) and gained early recognition for her roles in Manny & Lo (1996),
The Horse Whisperer (1998), and Ghost World (2001). Her shift to adult roles came in 2003 with Lost in Translation, for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress.
She continued to gain praise for playing a 17th-century servant in Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003), a troubled teenager in A Love Song for Bobby Long (2004) and a seductress in Match Point (2005).
The latter marked her first collaboration with Woody Allen, who later directed her in Scoop (2006) and Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008).
Johansson’s other works of this period include The Prestige (2006) and the albums Anywhere I Lay My Head (2008) and Break Up (2009), both of which charted on the Billboard 200.
In 2010, Johansson debuted on Broadway in a revival of A View from the Bridge, which won her the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play, and began portraying Black Widow in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Iron Man 2.
She reprised the role in eight films, leading up to her solo feature Black Widow (2021), gaining global stardom. During this period, Johansson starred in the science fiction films Her (2013), Under the Skin (2013) and Lucy (2014).
She received two simultaneous Academy Award nominations—Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress—for the respective roles of an actress going through a divorce in the drama Marriage Story (2019) .
And a single mother in Nazi Germany in the satire Jojo Rabbit (2019), becoming one of the few actors to achieve this feat.
Labeled a sex symbol, Johansson has been referred to as one of the world’s most attractive women by various media outlets.
She is a prominent brand endorser and supports several charitable causes. Divorced from actor Ryan Reynolds and businessman Romain Dauriac, Johansson has been married to comedian Colin Jost since 2020.
She has two children, one with Dauriac and another with Jost.
Early life
Scarlett Ingrid Johansson was born on November 22, 1984, in the Manhattan borough of New York City. Johansson’s father, Karsten Olaf Johansson, is an architect originally from Copenhagen, Denmark.
Through him, she is a granddaughter of Ejner Johansson, an art historian, screenwriter, and film director, whose own father was Swedish. Her mother, New Yorker Melanie Sloan, has worked as a producer.
She comes from a Jewish family who fled Poland and Russia, originally surnamed Schlamberg, and Johansson identifies as Jewish. She has an older sister named Vanessa, who is also an actress, an older brother named Adrian, and a twin brother named Hunter.
Scarlett Johansson also has an older half-brother named Christian from her father’s first marriage, and holds dual American and Danish citizenship.
On a 2017 episode of PBS’s Finding Your Roots, she discovered that her maternal great-grandfather’s brother and extended family died during the Holocaust in the Warsaw Ghetto.
Johansson attended PS 41, an elementary school in Greenwich Village, Manhattan. Her parents divorced when she was thirteen. She was particularly close to her maternal grandmother, Dorothy Sloan, a bookkeeper and schoolteacher.
They often spent time together and Johansson considered Dorothy her best friend. Interested in a career in the spotlight from an early age, Johansson often put on song-and-dance routines for her family.
She was particularly fond of musical theater and jazz hands. Johansson took lessons in tap dance, and states that her parents were supportive of her career choice.
She has described her childhood as very ordinary.
As a child, Johansson practiced acting by staring in the mirror until she made herself cry, wanting to be like Judy Garland in Meet Me in St. Louis.
At age seven, she was devastated when a talent agent signed one of her brothers instead of her, but later decided to become an actress anyway.
After enrolling at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute and auditioning for commercials, Johansson soon lost interest, stating “I didn’t want to promote Wonder Bread.”
She shifted her focus to film and theater, making her first stage appearance with two lines in the off-Broadway play Sophistry with Ethan Hawke.
Around this time, Johansson began studying at the Professional Children’s School, a private educational institution for aspiring child actors in Manhattan.
Personal life
While attending the Professional Children’s School, Scarlett Johansson dated classmate Jack Antonoff from 2001 to 2002. She dated her Black Dahlia co-star Josh Hartnett for about two years until the end of 2006.
According to Hartnett, they broke up because their busy schedules kept them apart. Johansson began dating Canadian actor Ryan Reynolds in 2007.
They became engaged in May 2008, married in September 2008 on Vancouver Island, separated in December 2010 and divorced in July 2011.
In November 2012, Johansson began dating Frenchman Romain Dauriac, the owner of an advertising agency.
They became engaged the following September. The pair divided their time between New York City and Paris.
She gave birth to their daughter in 2014. Johansson and Dauriac married that October in Philipsburg, Montana. They separated in mid-2016 and divorced in September 2017.
Johansson began dating Saturday Night Live co-head writer and Weekend Update co-host Colin Jost in May 2017.
In May 2019, the two were engaged. They married in October 2020, at their New York home. She gave birth to their son in August 2021. Johansson resides in New York and Los Angeles.
In September 2011, nude photographs of Johansson hacked from her cell phone were leaked online.
She said the pictures had been sent to her then-husband, Ryan Reynolds, three years prior to the incident.
In 2014, Johansson won a lawsuit against French publisher JC Lattès over libelous statements about her relationships in the novel The First Thing We Look At by Grégoire Delacourt.
She was awarded $3,400; she had sued for $68,000.
Johansson has criticized the media for promoting an image that causes unhealthy diets and eating disorders among women.
In an essay she wrote for The Huffington Post, she encouraged people to maintain a healthy body.
She posed nude for the March 2006 cover of Vanity Fair alongside actress Keira Knightley and fully clothed fashion designer Tom Ford.
The photograph sparked controversy as some believed it demonstrated that women are forced to flaunt their sexuality more often than men.
Philanthropy
Scarlett Johansson has supported various charitable organizations including Aid Still Required, Cancer Research UK, Stand Up To Cancer, Too Many Women (which works against breast cancer), and USA Harvest, which provides food for people in need.
In 2005, Johansson became a global ambassador for the aid and development agency Oxfam. In 2007, she took part in the anti-poverty campaign ONE, which was organized by U2’s lead singer Bono.
In March 2008, a UK-based bidder paid £20,000 on an eBay auction to benefit Oxfam, winning a hair and makeup treatment, a pair of tickets, and a chauffeured trip to accompany her on a 20-minute date to the world premiere of He’s Just Not That into You.
In January 2014, Johansson resigned from her Oxfam position after criticism of her promotion of SodaStream, whose main factory was based in Mishor Adumim, an Israeli settlement in the West Bank; Oxfam opposes all trade with such Israeli settlements.
Oxfam stated that it was thankful for her contributions in raising funds to fight poverty. Together with her Avengers co stars, Johansson raised $500,000 for the victims of Hurricane Maria.
In 2018, she collaborated with 300 women in Hollywood to set up the Time’s Up initiative to protect women from harassment and discrimination.
Johansson took part in the Women’s March in Los Angeles in January 2018, where she spoke on topics such as abuses of power, sharing her own experience.
She received backlash for calling out fellow actor James Franco on allegations of sexual misconduct as in the past she had defended working with Woody Allen amid an accusation by his daughter Dylan Farrow.
Johansson has given support to Operation Warrior Wellness, a division of the David Lynch Foundation that helps veterans learn Transcendental Meditation.
Her grand-uncle, Phillip Schlamberg, was the last American pilot to have been killed during WWII.
He had gone on a bombing mission with Jerry Yellin, who went on to become co-founder of Operation Warrior Wellness.
Music career
In 2006, Scarlett Johansson sang the track “Summertime” for Unexpected Dreams – Songs from the Stars, a non-profit collection of songs recorded by Hollywood actors.
She performed with the Jesus and Mary Chain for a Coachella reunion show in Indio, California, in April 2007.
The following year, Johansson appeared as the leading lady in Justin Timberlake’s music video, for “What Goes Around… Comes Around”,
Which was nominated for an MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year.
In May 2008, Johansson released her debut album Anywhere I Lay My Head, which consists of one original song and ten cover versions of Tom Waits songs, and features David Bowie and members from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Celebration.
Reviews of the album were mixed. Spin was not particularly impressed with Johansson’s singing. Some critics found it to be “surprisingly alluring”, “a bravely eccentric selection”, and “a brilliant album” with “ghostly magic”.
NME named the album the “23rd best album of 2008”, and it peaked at number 126 on the Billboard 200.
Johansson started listening to Waits when she was 11 or 12 years old, and said of him, “His melodies are so beautiful, his voice is so distinct and I had my own way of doing Tom Waits songs.”
In September 2009, Johansson and singer-songwriter Pete Yorn released a collaborative album, Break Up, inspired by Serge Gainsbourg’s duets with Brigitte Bardot. The album reached number 41 in the US.
In 2010, Steel Train released Terrible Thrills Vol. 1, which includes their favorite female artists singing songs from their self-titled album. Johansson is the first artist on the album, singing “Bullet”.
Johansson sang “One Whole Hour” for the 2011 soundtrack of the documentary film Wretches & Jabberers (2010).
And in 2012 sang on a J. Ralph track entitled “Before My Time” for the end credits of the climate documentary Chasing Ice (2012).
In February 2015, Johansson formed a band called the Singles with Este Haim from HAIM, Holly Miranda, Kendra Morris, and Julia Haltigan.
The group’s first single was called “Candy”. Johansson was issued a cease and desist order from the lead singer of the Los Angeles-based rock band the Singles, demanding she stop using their name.
In 2016, she performed “Trust in Me” for The Jungle Book soundtrack and “Set It All Free” and “I Don’t Wanna” for Sing: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack.
In 2018, Johansson collaborated with Pete Yorn again for an EP titled Apart, released June 1.
Public image
Scarlett Johansson is described as a sex symbol by the media. Already at the age of 17, when filming Lost in Translation,
She felt she was groomed as a “bombshell-type” actor, as she explained in a 2022 podcast with Bruce Bozzi.
The Sydney Morning Herald describes her as “the embodiment of male fantasy”.
During the filming of Match Point, director Woody Allen remarked upon her attractiveness, calling her “beautiful” and “sexually overwhelming”.
In 2014, The New Yorker film critic Anthony Lane wrote that “she is evidently, and profitably, aware of her sultriness, and of how much, down to the last inch, it contributes to the contours of her reputation.”
Johansson has expressed displeasure at being sexualized and maintains that a preoccupation with one’s attractiveness does not last.
She has stated that while she is flattered to be considered sexy, she finds the implication her strength comes from her sexuality confining.
She lost the role of Lisbeth Salander in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) because the film’s director David Fincher found her “too sexy” for the part.
In 2016, as a comment on the delays of producing a stand-alone Black Widow movie, Johansson cautioned that she may not want to wear a “skin-tight catsuit” for much longer.
Some media and fans call Johansson “ScarJo”, which she finds lazy, flippant, and insulting.
She has no social media profiles, saying she does not see the need “to continuously share details of [her] everyday life.”
Johansson ranks highly in various beauty listings. Maxim included her in their Hot 100 list from 2006 to 2014.
She has been named “Sexiest Woman Alive” twice by Esquire (2006 and 2013) and has been included in similar listings by Playboy (2007), Men’s Health (2011), and FHM (since 2005).
She was named GQ‘s Babe of the Year in 2010.
In 2022, Johansson founded the plant-based skincare line, The Outset, with Kate Foster.
Johansson was invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in June 2004. In 2006, she appeared on Forbes‘ Celebrity 100 list and again in 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2019.
She received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in May 2012. In 2021, she appeared on the Time 100, Time‘s annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Johansson was included on Forbes‘ annual list of the world’s highest-paid actresses from 2014 to 2016, with respective earnings of $17 million, $35.5 million, and $25 million.
She would later top the list in 2018 and 2019, with earnings of $40.5 million and $56 million, respectively. She was the highest-grossing actor of 2016, with a total of $1.2 billion.
IndieWire credited her for taking on risky roles, such as in Her and Under the Skin, instead of simply appearing in blockbuster after blockbuster.
As of September 2019, her films have grossed over $5.2 billion in North America and over $14.3 billion worldwide,
Making Johansson the third-highest-grossing box-office star of all time both domestically and worldwide as well as the highest-grossing actress of all time in North America.
Madame Tussauds New York museum unveiled a wax statue of her in 2015.
Johansson has appeared in advertising campaigns for Calvin Klein, Dolce & Gabbana, L’Oréal, and Louis Vuitton and has represented the Spanish brand Mango since 2009.
She was the first Hollywood celebrity to represent a champagne producer, appearing in advertisements for Moët & Chandon.
In January 2014, the Israeli company SodaStream, which makes home-carbonation products, hired Johansson as its first global brand ambassador, a relationship that commenced with a television commercial during Super Bowl XLVIII on February 2, 2014.
This created some controversy, as SodaStream at that time operated a plant in Israeli-occupied territory in the West Bank.
In May 2024, Johansson criticized OpenAI for releasing a chatbot with a voice that resembled her own, after she declined to formally work with the company to provide her voice for the app.
Political views
Scarlett Johansson was registered as an independent, at least through 2008, and campaigned for Democratic candidate John Kerry in the 2004 United States presidential election.
When George W. Bush was re-elected in 2004, she said she was disappointed.
In January 2008, her campaign for Democratic candidate Barack Obama included appearances in Iowa targeted at younger voters, an appearance at Cornell College, and a speaking engagement at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, on Super Tuesday, 2008.
Johansson appeared in the music video for rapper will.i.am’s song, “Yes We Can” (2008), directed by Jesse Dylan; the song was inspired by Obama’s speech after the 2008 New Hampshire primary.
In February 2012, Johansson and Anna Wintour hosted a fashion launch of clothing and accessories, whose proceeds went to Obama’s re-election campaign.
She addressed voters at the Democratic National Convention in September 2012, calling for Obama’s re-election and for more engagement from young voters.
She encouraged women to vote for Obama and condemned Mitt Romney for his opposition to Planned Parenthood.
Johansson publicly endorsed and supported Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer’s 2013 run for New York City Comptroller by hosting a series of fundraisers.
To encourage people to vote in the 2016 presidential election, in which Johansson endorsed Hillary Clinton, she appeared in a commercial alongside her Marvel Cinematic Universe co-star Robert Downey Jr., and Joss Whedon.
In 2017, she spoke at the Women’s March on Washington, addressing Donald Trump’s presidency and stating that she would support the president if he works for women’s rights and stops withdrawing federal funding for Planned Parenthood.
During the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, Johansson endorsed Elizabeth Warren, calling her “thoughtful and progressive but realistic”.
In December 2020, three members of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, an Egyptian civil rights organization, were released from prison in Egypt,
After Johansson had described their detention circumstances and demanded the trio’s release.
