Actor & Musician
Michael Peña: Biography at a Glance
- Michael Peña is an American actor and musician, known for his starring roles in César Chávez and Narcos: Mexico.
- He can currently be seen starring in A Million Miles Away, a biopic about José Hernandez and his path from a farm worker to becoming an engineer and an astronaut.
- Peña’s breakthrough performances came in two Best Picture Oscar-winning films, Million Dollar Baby and Crash.
- He starred in 12 Strong alongside Chris Hemsworth and the remake of A Wrinkle in Time, where he played the main antagonist, The IT, in his human form name, Red.
- Other film credits include Shooter, Observe and Report, End of Watch, Gangster Squad, American Hustle, Fury, The Martian, CHiPs, Ant-Man and its sequel Ant-Man and the Wasp, among others.
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Michael Peña is an American actor and musician. He has starred in many films, such as Crash (2004), World Trade Center (2006), Shooter (2007), Observe and Report (2009), Tower Heist (2011), Battle: Los Angeles (2011), End of Watch (2012), Gangster Squad (2013), American Hustle (2013), Fury (2014), Frontera (2014), The Martian (2015), Collateral Beauty (2016), CHiPs (2017), My Little Pony: The Movie (2017), Ant-Man (2015) and its sequel Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018), A Wrinkle in Time (2018) and 12 Strong (2018). Peña also had the title role in Cesar Chavez (2014) and plays the co-lead role in the TV series Narcos: Mexico (2018).
Peña’s breakthrough performances came in two Best Picture Oscar-winning films, Million Dollar Baby (2004) and Crash (2004). Peña received attention for his particularly emotional performance in Crash. The following year, he appeared on the Golden Globe winning series, The Shield. In 2006, he starred in Oliver Stone's film based on the September 11, 2001 attacks, World Trade Center. He also had a role in Alejandro González Iñárritu's film Babel. This gives him the rare distinction of having appeared in three consecutive Oscar nominated films.
In 2006, Peña starred in the HBO film Walkout as Sal Castro, a Mexican-American high school teacher who inspires a group of East L.A. high school students to fight for Chicano rights.
He also starred alongside Mark Wahlberg in Shooter (2007) as novice FBI agent Nick Memphis. In 2009, he played a mall security guard alongside Seth Rogen in Jody Hill's Observe and Report.
In 2012, he co-starred with Jake Gyllenhaal as a Los Angeles police officer, in End of Watch. The same year, he began filming César Chávez, a biopic about the life of American labor leader César Chávez, who founded the United Farm Workers. Peña stars as Chávez. He appeared alongside Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, and Jon Bernthal in the World War II-set action film Fury (2014), and portrayed Luis in Ant-Man (2015).
Peña starred in 12 Strong along Chris Hemsworth and the 2018 remake of A Wrinkle in Time, where he played the main antagonist, The IT, in his human form name, Red.
On television, Peña starred as DEA agent Kiki Camarena in the series Narcos: Mexico. Peña also voiced the character Ricky in the FX animated comedy Chozen. Peña played animated roles, including Turbo where he voiced Tito and My Little Pony: The Movie where he voices Grubber.
