When we watch our favourite actors on the big screen, we seldom think about their linguistic abilities. However, many celebrities are bilingual or even multilingual, with several speaking Spanish fluently or at an impressive level.
In this article, we introduce twelve famous actors who have skilfully mastered Spanish as a second language. Some chose to learn Spanish for a particular role, others picked it up from their community growing up, and still others studied it out of pure passion. Let’s discover them now!
1. Gwyneth Paltrow
Like many people in the US, Gwyneth Paltrow studied Spanish as a foreign language in school. Unlike most, however, she took the opportunity to spend a year as an exchange student in Salamanca, Spain, during high school. She has maintained contact with her host family and continued to improve her language skills ever since. Her accent is also really good!
2. Will Smith
Will Smith learned some basic Spanish for his role in the film Seven Pounds, in which there were many Spanish-speaking scenes. He later went on to use his Spanish abilities in the film The Pursuit of Happiness. His accent isn’t the best, but it isn’t the worst I’ve heard either!
3. Tom Hiddleston
The Avengers star, known for playing supervillain Loki, has a true affinity for European languages. While at the University of Cambridge, he studied Greek and Latin, and has since learned Spanish, French, Italian, and Greek to varying degrees of fluency. You can often see him giving interviews in his favourite languages.
4. Chris Pine
Chris Pine, who plays Captain Kirk in the new version of Star Trek, has a fairly good command of basic Spanish thanks to six years of high school classes. His accent isn’t half bad either as you can hear from this interview!
5. Freddie Highmore
Few celebrities on this list have achieved a high level of fluency in Spanish, but Freddie Highmore, the child star of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, is definitely one of them. In addition to being fluent in French, he studied Spanish and Arabic at Cambridge University and speaks Spanish fluently. His accent is also very impressive.
6. Matthew McConaughey
Spanish has always been a part of Matthew McConaughey’s life. Born in Texas, just 80 miles from the Mexican border, he had many Spanish-speaking friends during his formative years and continues to use it today. Admittedly, his Spanish grammar is far from perfect and he has a strong southern accent when he speaks, but props to him for trying!
7. Amber Heard
American actress Amber Heard can speak fairly good Spanish. She grew up in Texas, which helped her develop the basics of the language, and currently lives in Spain, splitting her time between Madrid and Mallorca according to Marca.com.
8. Ben Affleck
When Ben Affleck was 13, he lived in Mexico for a year filming a TV show for kids, and this is when his Spanish learning journey began. Despite returning to the US, he has continued to practise his Spanish and you’ll even see him giving interviews in the language. His vocabulary and grammar need some work but he speaks quickly and fluidly and his accent is actually pretty good!
9. Casey Affleck
Casey Affleck, Ben Affleck’s younger brother, learned Spanish while living in Mexico as well, though he was just 10 at the time. He struggles to communicate more than his brother but has a decent accent.
10. Viggo Mortensen
Viggo Mortensen is the true definition of a polyglot. In addition to speaking excellent Spanish (with an Argentinian accent, I might add), he is also fluent in Danish, English, and French, is conversational in Italian, and understands Norwegian and Swedish. Viggo lived in Argentina until he was 11 years old, which explains his fluency.
11. Matt Damon
As he explained in an interview with The Guardian, Matt Damon visited Mexico and Guatemala multiple times as a teenager, attending a full immersion language school, living with a host family, and backpacking across the country. These experiences all allowed him to develop his Spanish speaking skills. He also has an Argentine wife, Luciana Bozán, and their daughters are bilingual.
12. Meghan Markle
Meghan Markle, former actress turned Duchess of Sussex, is conversational in Spanish thanks to the time she spent interning at the US embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina during college, and her study abroad period in Madrid.
