Eva Mendes, 48, is an actress, model and businesswoman with a net worth of $20 million (around £17 million).
She has appeared in a range of films since 1998. It was while she was filming The Place Beyond the Pines in 2011 that Mendes met and began dating fellow actor Ryan Gosling, 42.
The couple is notorious for keeping their lives private. But in 2016, People magazine speculated that they had tied the knot — a rumour yet to be confirmed.
On Tuesday, Mendes posted a photo on Instagram of her new wrist tattoo to further fuel rumours of marriage.
The post read “de Gosling”, with “de” in Hispanic culture unifying the woman’s maiden name with her husband’s surname after marriage.
Eva Mendes and Ryan Gosling’s relationship
According to sources, the pair have been “friends for years” with the duo spotted spending quality time together after working on the project back in 2011.
In September of that year, the couple made their relationship public after spending the day together at Disneyland acting “playful” with “Eva skipping around like a little girl”.
More public appearances were seen that year with the lovebirds being caught passionately kissing in Mendes’ car and were again seen out and about in France, New York, and Canada.
The duo posed together on the red carpet at the premiere of The Place Beyond the Pines later spending Thanksgiving weekend together.
In July 2014, they confirmed that they were expecting their first child together daughter Esmeralda Amada and two years later announced the arrival of their second daughter, Amada Lee.
Gosling spoke of his relationship to Mendes for Hello! magazine saying: “I know that I’m with the person I’m supposed to be with. There’s nothing else I’m looking for.”
Early life
Mendes was born on March 5, 1974, in Miami, Florida, to working-class Cuban parents.
She later moved to the Los Angeles area of Silver Lake and was raised by her mother after her parents divorced when she was 10.
Stardom did not appear to be on the cards for the young Mendes. She went on to study marketing at California State University, Northridge.
But then, photographs of Mendes garnered interest from a talent manager and a showbiz career began in earnest.
Eva Mendes’s film career
Acting gigs were not initially plentiful for Mendes, although she appeared in a few music videos.
The actress describes facing much bigotry after being told she was “too ethnic” looking.
However, she once described how this negativity was the motivation for her to progress in acting.
“I used it as a challenge, to give me that fire or extra kick I needed to break through,” Mendes said.
Her determination to succeed was rewarded when she landed her first film role in the 1998 horror, Children of the Corn V: Fields of Terror.
However, it was her breakout role playing Denzel Washington’s mistress in Training Day in 2001 that catapulted Mendes to stardom. The movie grossed a staggering $104.5 million at the box office.
Following Training Day’s success, Mendes played an undercover United States Customs Service agent alongside Paul Walker and Tyrese Gibson in 2 Fast 2 Furious.
The 2003 film was another box-office hit, grossing over $236 million globally.
In the same year, Mendes tried her hand at comedy in Stuck on You alongside Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear. She did likewise in 2005 when she appeared in Hitch with Will Smith.
Comedic roles proved to be a success for Mendes. She appeared in The Women, which starred Meg Ryan, in 2008 and The Other Guys in 2010 with Will Farrell and Mark Wahlberg.
The Place Beyond the Pines saw Mendes returning to a more dramatic role. She played a down-on-her-luck waitress alongside Bradley Cooper and Gosling.