Aria Mia Loberti

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Aria Mia Loberti
Aria Mia Loberti at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival (cropped).jpg
Aria Mia Loberti at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival Nutcrackers premiere
Born1994 (age 2930)
Occupations
  • Actress
  • Academic
Known for All the Light We Cannot See

Aria Mia Loberti (born 1994) [1] is an American actress. She stars as Marie-Laure Leblanc in the Netflix miniseries All the Light We Cannot See . She won her inaugural role from a global search of thousands of actresses. [2]

Contents

Biography

Aria Mia Loberti was born and raised into an Italian-American family in Johnston, Rhode Island. [3] Dissatisfied with her treatment in public school, her parents homeschooled her from the third through twelfth grades. [2] As a child and teen, she trained intensively in classical ballet at the preprofessional level. [4] She also trained in martial arts [5] and holds a yoga teaching certification, working as a certified yoga teacher throughout college. [6]

Loberti attended the University of Rhode Island from 2016 to 2020. She graduated summa cum laude with three majors — Philosophy, Communication Studies, and Political Science — and minors in Ancient Greek language and Rhetoric, and completed the Honors Program. [7] [8] She received her master's degree in ancient rhetoric with distinction in 2021 from Royal Holloway, University of London on a Fulbright Scholarship. [9] She started her doctoral studies in ancient rhetoric at Pennsylvania State University in 2021, [10] when she began to question her career path. [11] She then responded on a whim to an All The Light We Cannot See open global casting search posted online.

Acting career

Loberti’s inaugural acting role was the lead character of Marie-Laure Leblanc in Netflix's adaptation of the 2014 novel All the Light We Cannot See . It was also her first audition. [12] [13] [14] Her performance has been universally praised by critics, described as "graceful and affecting", [15] "luminous", [16] "resonant, [and] captivating", [17] and a "radiant…good and pure presence that grounds the series' sense of jeopardy". [18] Her co-star Mark Ruffalo referred to her as "a revelation". [19]

She received a Rising Star Award at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival [20] and an Entertainment Weekly Breaking Big Award at the 2023 SCAD Savannah Film Festival. [21] She was nominated for Best Breakthrough Performance at the 2024 Film Independent Spirit Awards. [22] [23]

Loberti, who has low vision due to a form of the genetic condition achromatopsia, [24] landed the part after a global search for an actor who is blind or low-vision. A fan of the book, she auditioned after learning about the search from a childhood orientation and mobility teacher. [25] [26] Despite no acting training, Loberti beat out thousands of submissions to secure the role three weeks after she sent in her self tape. [27] Director Shawn Levy stated of Loberti: "I didn't know what she had acted in, I didn't know what her training was, all I knew is that there was a combination of intelligence, which was extremely self-evident, and a luminous quality on camera… I later found out that not only was she new to acting—she had never even auditioned before." [28]

In September 2023, it was announced that Loberti would serve as the new face of the beauty and skincare brand L'Occitane en Provence. [29] [30] In November 2023, it was announced that she would narrate a new audiobook version of Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea . [31] She also appeared in the television adaptation of The Spiderwick Chronicles . [32]

Activism

Loberti is also a human rights activist and began speaking up for her own and others' educational and accessibility rights at just four years old. [33] [34] On April 18, 2024, Loberti was announced as the newest UNICEF Ambassador. [35] [36] She has been an active supporter of UNICEF since 2022 and has traveled with the organization specifically to support educational rights, children’s literacy access, and climate change efforts. [37]

Filmography

YearTitleRoleNotes
2023 All the Light We Cannot See Marie-Laure LeBlancMiniseries, acting debut
2024 Grey's Anatomy Vida MaderaEpisode: "Baby Can I Hold You"
2024 The Spiderwick Chronicles Valentina5 episodes

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References

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  2. 1 2 "Legally blind Johnston native makes 'authentic' Netflix debut: Aria Mia Loberti is an advocate, scholar, URI graduate and now an actress". February 3, 2022.
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  10. "CAS Directory: Aria Mia Loberti", Penn State, https://cas.la.psu.edu/people/aml7282 Archived July 3, 2022, at the Wayback Machine
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  37. "Ahead of Earth Day Aria Mia Loberti visits with children and youth to discuss child rights and climate action in Kosovo". unicef.org. Retrieved November 8, 2023.