Monica Barbaro

Monica Maria Barbaro is an American actress known for her work on stage and screen. She gained widespread recognition for her roles in television and major feature films, including her portrayal of naval aviator Lieutenant Natasha "Phoenix" Trace in Top Gun: Maverick and activist Joan Baez in the biopic A Complete Unknown. Over the course of her career, she has received two nominations for an Actor Award and one nomination for an Academy Award.

Barbaro was born on June 17, 1990, in San Francisco, California, to Heidi and Nicholas Barbaro. She grew up in Mill Valley, California, with her sister, Eva, and her brother, Michael. Her father is Italian American, and her mother is of Mexican, German, and Nicaraguan descent. She began studying ballet and dancing at an early age. After graduating from Tamalpais High School in 2007, she attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, taking acting electives and completing a degree in dance in 2010.

After completing her degree, Barbaro returned to San Francisco to pursue acting. She booked a commercial and a short film, connected with an agent, and studied at the Beverly Hills Playhouse. She first gained attention in 2013 for her lead role in the viral comedy short It's Not About the Nail. She transitioned into television roles, portraying Yael in the second season of UnREAL in 2016 and character Anna Valdez in the NBC legal drama Chicago Justice. Her early television credits also include Chicago P.D., Netflix's The Good Cop as Cora Vasquez, and a recurring role in Splitting Up Together.

Barbaro made her feature film debut in the 2021 independent film The Cathedral. She achieved a major career breakthrough in 2022 with the action film Top Gun: Maverick, which became a critical and financial success and received a Best Picture nomination. In 2023, she starred in the romantic comedy At Midnight, performing a dance scene drawing on her background as a professional dancer. From 2023 to 2025, she held a leading role in the Netflix action comedy series FUBAR alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In 2024, Barbaro portrayed folk singer Joan Baez in the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, directed by James Mangold. She took singing and guitar lessons for the role and performed musical duets in the film. Her performance brought critical acclaim and earned her nominations for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role.

In 2025, Barbaro was included in Time magazine's Time 100 Next list. She made her stage debut in a West End revival of Les Liaisons Dangereuses at the Royal National Theatre. Her subsequent film projects include the romantic comedy One Night Only, the action film Crime 101, portraying Mira Murati in the biographical drama Artificial, and being cast in an untitled Ocean's Eleven prequel.