Pom Klementieff

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Pom Klementieff
Stuttgart -Comic Con Germany 2019- 7d by-RaBoe 037 (cropped).jpg
Klementieff in 2019
Born
Pom Alexandra Klementieff

(1986-05-03) 3 May 1986 (age 35)
Quebec City, Quebec, Canada
EducationCours Florent
OccupationActress
Years active2007–present
Signature
Pom Klementieff signature.svg

Pom Alexandra Klementieff (born 3 May 1986[1]) is a French actress and model. She was trained at the Cours Florent drama school in Paris and appeared in such French films as The Easy Way (2008) and Sleepless Night (2011), before making her American film debut in Oldboy (2013).

Klementieff received worldwide recognition for her role as Mantis in the Marvel Cinematic Universe films Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), and Avengers: Endgame (2019).

Early life[]

Pom Klementieff was born in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada, to a Korean mother and French-Russian father, who was working there as a consul with the government of France. She is a French citizen, and does not have Canadian citizenship because jus soli does not apply to children of diplomats.[2][3][4] Her grandfather was the Russian painter Eugene Klementieff.[5] Her parents chose the name "Pom" because it is similar in pronunciation to the Korean words for both "spring" (봄) and "tiger" (범).[3] Klementieff lived in Canada for one year before her family began travelling extensively due to her father's job.[6] They lived in Japan and Ivory Coast, before settling in France.

Klementieff's father died of cancer when she was five, and her mother had schizophrenia and was unable to care for children,[3] so Klementieff was raised by her paternal uncle and aunt.[2] Her uncle, whom she described as "like [her] second father", died on her 18th birthday, and her older brother died of suicide seven years later, on her 25th birthday.[3] Klementieff briefly attended law school after her uncle's death to appease her aunt but did not find the career path appealing. She also worked as a waitress and saleswoman in France.[3] She started acting at age 19 at the Cours Florent drama school in Paris. A few months into her education, she won a theatre competition that awarded her free classes for two years with the school's top teachers.[6]

Career[]

2007–2012: Early career[]

Klementieff at the 2018 Brussels Comic Con

Klementieff's first professional acting job was the French independent film Après lui (2007), portraying the stepdaughter of the protagonist played by Catherine Deneuve.[2] Filming for her scenes took three days. During one scene, Klementieff was supposed to push someone down a set of stairs but accidentally fell down the stairs herself, and director Gaël Morel kept that shot in the final film.

Her first leading role was in Loup (2009), a French film about a tribe of reindeer herders in the Siberian mountains. During filming, Klementieff stayed in a camp, hours from the nearest village, where temperatures dropped well below zero. During filming she befriended nomads who lived there, worked with real wolves, rode reindeer, and swam with a horse in a lake.[6]

2013–present: Breakthrough[]

Klementieff made her Hollywood debut in Spike Lee's Oldboy (2013), a remake of the South Korean film of the same name.[6][7] She portrayed Haeng-bok, the bodyguard of the antagonist played by Sharlto Copley. A fan of the original film, Klementieff heard about the part through Roy Lee, a producer with the remake, and took boxing lessons after learning the role involved martial arts. After showcasing her boxing skills during her audition, Lee asked her to go home and come back wearing a more feminine outfit and make-up, like her character in the film.[2][3] She contributed some of her own clothes to the character's wardrobe,[2] and trained three hours a day for two months for an on-screen fight with star Josh Brolin.[2][7] Klementieff came up with the name Haeng-bok, Korean for "happiness", herself after Lee asked her to research possible names for the character.[2][6]

Klementieff moved to Los Angeles after Oldboy was filmed and began pursuing more Hollywood auditions.[2][6] She continued taekwondo after the film, and has a purple belt as of the summer of 2014.[2] Her next acting role was the film Hacker's Game (2015), in which she plays a hacker she compared to Lisbeth Salander from the novel The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Klementieff used her boxing skills again in the film, and due to the movie's low budget, she had to do her own make-up and choose her own wardrobe.[6] It was her idea to dye her hair purple for the role, to which the directors first objected but later acquiesced.[2] In 2017, she appeared in the romance drama Newness and the black comedy-drama Ingrid Goes West.

Klementieff received worldwide recognition when she joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Mantis, appearing in the films Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), and Avengers: Endgame (2019).[8] In 2019, she appeared in an episode of the Netflix science fiction anthology series Black Mirror, the thriller film Uncut Gems, and had voice roles in the animated supernatural comedy film The Addams Family. In 2020, she had a recurring role as Martel in the HBO science fiction series Westworld.

Filmography[]

Film[]

Key
Denotes productions that have not yet been released Denotes films that have not yet been released
Year Title Role Director Notes
2007 After Him Emilie Gaël Morel
2008 The Easy Way NHI Jean-Paul Rouve
2009 Loup Nastazya Nicolas Vanier
2011 Borderline Naomi Alexandre Coffre
Delicacy The Waitress David & Stéphane Foenkinos
Sleepless Night Lucy Frédéric Jardin
Love Lasts Three Years Julia Frédéric Beigbeder
Silhouettes Valerie Lars Knorrn
2012 Radiostars The Pizza Girl Romain Lévy
Porn in the Hood Tia Franck Gastambide
2013 Paris Or Perish Jess Reem Kherici
Oldboy Haeng-bok Spike Lee
2015 Hacker's Game Loise Cyril Morin
2017 Newness Bethany Drake Doremus
Ingrid Goes West Harley Chung Matt Spicer
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Mantis James Gunn
2018 Avengers: Infinity War Anthony & Joe Russo
Time of Day Herself Thimios Bakatakis Short film
2019 Avengers: Endgame Mantis Anthony & Joe Russo
Uncut Gems Lexis Benny & Josh Safdie
The Addams Family Layla & Kayla (voice) Greg Tiernan & Conrad Vernon
2021 Save Ralph A rabbit (voice) / Ralph (voice, French version) Spencer Susser Short film
Thunder Force Laser Ben Falcone
The Suicide Squad Dancer James Gunn Cameo
2022 Thor: Love and Thunder dagger Mantis Taika Waititi Post-production
Mission: Impossible 7 dagger Christopher McQuarrie Post-production

Television[]

Year Title Role Notes
2009 Pigalle, la nuit Sandra 8 episodes
2019 Black Mirror Roxette Episode: "Striking Vipers"
2020 Westworld Martel 3 episodes

Theme park attractions[]

Year Title Role Venue
2017 Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission Breakout! Mantis Disney California Adventure

Notes[]

References[]

  1. ^ "Qui es-tu Pom Klementieff?/Who are you Pom Klementieff?". Première (in French). France. 7 July 2012. Archived from the original on 1 January 2018. Retrieved 1 January 2018. Miss Klementieff est née au Québec le 3 mai 1986, d'un père russe et d'une mère coréenne./Miss Klementieff was born in Quebec on 3 May 1986 to a Russian father and a Korean mother. Additional WebCitation archive on 1 January 2018.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g h i j "Actress Pom Klementieff from Spike Lee's Oldboy". Filler Magazine. 2 (5). Summer 2014. Archived from the original on 6 December 2013. Retrieved 2 July 2014. Additional Archive.is archive on 7 July 2014.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f Han, Steve (November 2013). "Korean French Actress Pom Klementieff Makes US Debut in 'Oldboy' Remake". KoreAm. Archived from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 5 July 2014. So I told [filmmaker Spike Lee], my father died when I was 5. My mother, she is schizophrenic, so she couldn’t take care of me and my brother, who died by suicide a few months before the audition [for Lee's remake of Oldboy].
  4. ^ I'm French, not Canadian! I was born in Quebec under diplomatic passport. Was never able to get the Canadian passport because of that. Xxx.
  5. ^ "Login • Instagram".
  6. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g Chang, Mina (2 July 2013). "Q&A with Pom Klementieff". Anthem Magazine. Archived from the original on 7 January 2014. Retrieved 5 July 2014.
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b De Ville, Reece (7 April 2014). "Interview: Oldboy's ass kicking, earth moving Pom Klementieff". TheDigitalFix.com. Archived from the original on 23 July 2017. Retrieved 5 July 2014.
  8. ^ Romano, Nick (28 January 2017). "Avengers: Infinity War adds Mantis from Guardians of the Galaxy 2". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on 29 January 2017. Retrieved 28 January 2017.

External links[]

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