Biography:

Born in New York City on November 22, 1984, Scarlett Johansson is the youngest of four children, she has an older brother and sister, and a twin brother. She admits to having had an early interest in acting and the stage: She wanted to be an actress since the age of four, and was acting professionally when she was only eight years old. After attending acting classes at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute for Young People, she made her stage introduction in the 1990's off-Broadway production of "Sophistry", next to super star Ethan Hawke.

Her first film role came in 1994's "North", starring Elijah Wood. The following year she played Sean Connery's daughter in the thriller "Just Cause", and then in 1996 was hired and cast in "If Lucy Fell" starring Ben Stiller and Sarah Jessica Parker, and then appeared in "Manny & Lo" as Amanda. For her work, she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Actress. That same year she worked on "Home Alone 3", the last of the "Home Alone" franchise made famous by young teen heart-throb Macaulay Culkin.

In 1998, her career took off. Hired and cast as Grace MacLean, a young girl who suffers a disastrous horse riding accident in "The Horse Whisperer" opposite leading man Robert Redford. She hailed as the most gifted actor on the project. The thirteen year old actress was awarded a Hollywood Reporter Young Star Award for her efforts. 

Building on the energy of "The Horse Whisperer", she next appeared in "My Brother the Pig" (1999) with Eva Mendes, and then co-starred with Thora Birch in Terry Zwigoff's version of the comic book "Ghost World" with Brad Renfro.

The follwoing year she grabbed more attention in a role in the Coen brothers' "The Man Who Wasn't There" starring Billy Bob Thornton. Also in 2001, she starred in "An American Rhapsody", a Hungarian film about a young girl who escapes from behind the iron curtain in the 1950's. 

The year 2003 would prove to be the year the actress became a Hollywood celebrity. She starred in Sofia Coppola's "Lost in Translation", as a young girl living in Japan who becomes friends with a washed up American actor, played by Bill Murray. She followed with Colin Firth starring in "Girl with a Pearl Earring", where she played the lead - a stressed out servant who becomes pulled into the world of Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer. Both roles brought her Best Actress Golden Globe nominations in 2004, and a Best Actress BAFTA Award for "Lost in Translation".

With the 2004 comedy "The Perfect Score", she showed that she can take on comedic roles as well as serious ones. She divides her time living between New York City, where her father lives, and Los Angeles, where her mother runs her business. In 2005, she appeared in two movies,  "Match Point" and "The Island" starring Ewan McGregor. She was also hired as advertising spokesperson for Calvin Klein perfume "Eternity Moment." In 2006 she was named the face of L'Oreal.

She worked on two movies that year including "The Black Dahlia" with Hilary Swank, and "The Prestige" alongside Christian Bale. And to top off a busy year she was the star in Bob Dylan's music video "When the Deal Goes Down." In 2007, she played Annie Braddock in "The Nanny Diaries".

During 2008, she worked on several projects including "The Other Boleyn Girl" working along side Natalie Portman - a spectacular and sexual story of deception, love, romance and betrayal set in old Europe, where two gorgeous sisters, Anne and Mary Boleyn, compete for the love and sex of the handsome King Henry VIII. Her next project was "Mary Queen of Scots" (2008) - a story of the life and reign of Mary I of Scotland, with a focus on her bad personal and political relationship with her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I of England.

Next was the star-packed comedy "He's Just Not That Into You" with Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Connelly and Ben Affleck, the Baltimore-set movie of interconnecting story arcs deals with the challenges of reading or misreading human behavior. She then starred in the dramatic action movie "The Spirit" (2008) with Samuel L. Jackson and Eva Mendes, where rookie cop Denny Colt returns from the beyond as "The Spirit", a hero whose mission is to fight against the bad forces in Central City.