Winning Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival 2016, "Ma' Rosa" star Jaclyn Jose made history as the first Southeast Asian actress to win the award from the prestigious invitation-only film festival founded in 1946. The Filipino actress beat Academy Award winners Charlize Theron, 40, and Marion Cotillard.
Theron won Best Actress at the 2004 Academy Awards for her performance in Patty Jenkins' "Monster." She starred opposite Academy Award winner Javier Bardiem in "The Last Face," which directed by her former boyfriend Sean Penn.
"The Last Face" debuted at the Cannes Film Festival 2016. Theron and Penn's reunion on the red carpet became controversial as the two reportedly avoided each other at press events before the premiere.
"Sean and his cast, including Charlize, all did their group photos together on the red carpet," a source told Page Six. However, the source added that Theron kept her distance from Penn after their awkward, friendly hug and kiss on the red carpet.
On the other hand, Cotillard won Best Actress at the 2008 Academy Awards for her performance in Olivier Dahan's "La Vie en Rose." She starred in "From the Land of the Moon," which competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.
Currently, Cotillard is filming Robert Zemeckis' "Allied" with Brad Pitt and Lizzy Caplan. On May 21, Cotillard and Pitt were on set in Las Palmas in the Canary Islands, where they drew crowds of locals, Daily Mail reported.
Jose did not expect to win the Cannes Film Festival 2016 best actress award considering that she was going up against award-winning actresses like Theron and Cotillard. While she is the first Southeast Asian actress to win the award, this is not her first time to be in the prestigious film event.
In 2008, Jose was one of the cast members of "Serbis," the first Filipino film to compete at the main competition in Cannes Film Festival since the 1984 film "Bayan Ko: Kapit sa Patalim" by the late Lino Brocka. She was nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the 2009 Asian Film Awards for her performance in "Serbis" but lost to her co-actor Gina Pareno.
Brillante Mendoza, the first Filipino filmmaker to win the Cannes Film Festival best director award for his film "Kinatay," directed both "Serbis" and "Ma' Rosa." Watch the trailer of "Ma' Rosa" here: