Bio: Michael Pe?a was born and raised in Chicago, to Nicolasa, a social worker, and Eleuterio Pe?a, who worked at a button factory. His parents were originally from Mexico. After graduating from high school, he went to an open casting call for the Peter Bogdanovich feature To Sir, with Love II (1996), and to his surprise, beat out hundreds of other young men for a role. After relocating to Los Angeles Pe?a quickly booked a succession of roles in features including Star Maps, My Fellow Americans (1996) (opposite Jack Lemmon and James Garner), La Cucaracha (1998) (winner of the Best Picture in the Austin Film Festival), Bellyfruit (1999), and the Disney/Jerry Bruckheimer feature Gone in 60 Seconds (2000). Michael resides in Los Angeles, where he plays bass guitar with his band, plays golf, and boxes for relaxation.
Tivia: A profile of Pe?a revealed that for every film he's cast in, he asks the writers to include a reference to his character being Mexican-American at some point. Pe?a related that since he gets to mainly play characters who are not stereotypes & clich��s, but are smart, funny, and have good/interesting jobs, he loves the fact that mentioning his own heritage in that context will be a source of pride to Mexican-American fans who go to his films.He appeared in 5 movies nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award - Million Dollar Baby (2004), Crash (2005), Babel (2006), American Hustle (2013), and The Martian (2015) - with the first two movies winning consecutively.He has worked with 4 directors who have won a Best Director Oscar: Clint Eastwood, Oliver Stone, Alejandro G. I?��rritu, and Robert Redford.Michael welcomed his first child, a boy named Roman, with his wife, Brie Shaffer, in September 2008.One of his first jobs was working in a bank.Is Mexican-American. His father was from Villa Purificaci��n in Jalisco and his mother was from Charcas in San Luis Potos��.Friends with William Lee Scott.Became a Scientologist before his career took off.