Fernanda Machado is a Brazilian film, television, and stage actress. Fernanda was born in the south of Brazil where she began her career in the theatre at the age of 14. She left her hometown at 17 to attend a performing arts college and was soon invited to audition for her first soap opera of TV Globo. She succeeded and was quickly noticed by the most important film and television directors in Brazil. In 2007 she played the leading female in "Elite Squad" which became one of the most famous and popular movies in Brazil, directed by Jose Padilha and produced by Harvey Weinstein. "Elite Squad" won best picture at the Berlin Film Festival in 2008. Since then she has continued in theatre with plays like "The Lie of the Mind" (a Sam Shepard Play), and thrived on television in popular soap operas like "Paraiso Tropical" in which she won best supporting actress in Brazil. Fernanda completed her first American movie "The Brazilian" in August 2012.