Ryan Thomas Gosling was born on 12 November 1980 in London, Ontario, and grew up largely in Cornwall, Ontario, a small city on the St Lawrence River close to the US border. He was raised by his mother after his parents separated, spent part of his schooling being home-taught, and was drawn to performing early, singing and dancing at local talent shows and weddings with his sister. His route out of small-town Ontario was unusual: at 12 he won a place on a Disney children’s variety programme, which moved him to Florida and set the pattern of a career that has never quite followed the standard Hollywood track, as the CBC has traced.

That Disney break was “The All-New Mickey Mouse Club”, on which Gosling appeared from 1993 to 1995 alongside Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Justin Timberlake. He was the show’s first Canadian cast member, a distinction the CBC has noted. Back in Canada he worked steadily in youth television, including “Are You Afraid of the Dark?” and “Goosebumps”, before landing the lead in the syndicated series “Young Hercules”. His first serious film role came in “The Believer” (2001), a hard-edged drama about a Jewish neo-Nazi that won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and showed that the former Mouseketeer had real range.

Two releases in quick succession made him. “The Notebook” (2004), a romantic drama adapted from Nicholas Sparks, turned him into a mainstream heartthrob, while “Half Nelson” (2006), in which he played a drug-addicted inner-city teacher, earned him his first Academy Award nomination for best actor. He spent the following years alternating between independent films and studio work, and 2011 was the year he became a genuine leading man: “Crazy, Stupid, Love”, “The Ides of March” and “Drive” all opened within months of one another. “Drive”, Nicolas Winding Refn’s neon-lit crime thriller, played in competition at the Festival de Cannes, where Refn won best director, and it gave Gosling the laconic screen persona he has been associated with ever since.

Damien Chazelle’s musical “La La Land” (2016) brought the biggest acclaim of his career to that point. Gosling learned jazz piano for the role and won the Golden Globe for best actor in a musical or comedy, according to Variety, as well as a second Oscar nomination. He followed it with “Blade Runner 2049” (2017) and the Neil Armstrong biopic “First Man” (2018). Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” (2023) then made him part of a global phenomenon: the film had taken $1.18 billion worldwide within a month of release, and Variety reported that Margot Robbie stood to make roughly $50 million in salary and box-office bonuses. Gosling’s turn as Ken earned him a third Oscar nomination, this time for best supporting actor, as CNN reported.

In 2026 he led “Project Hail Mary”, Amazon MGM’s adaptation of Andy Weir’s novel, which he also produced. The studio committed about $200 million to the production, according to Variety, and the film went on to gross about $685 million worldwide, according to Box Office Mojo, making it the studio’s most successful theatrical release.

Gosling’s award record now runs to three Academy Award nominations, a Golden Globe win and repeated recognition from critics’ groups. The “Barbie” campaign added something different: his performance of the film’s power ballad “I’m Just Ken” at the 2024 Academy Awards, staged with Slash and Mark Ronson, was one of the most talked-about moments of the ceremony, as Billboard reported. His next two franchise roles confirm how far his standing has risen. He leads “Star Wars: Starfighter”, directed by Shawn Levy and due in cinemas on 28 May 2027, according to The Hollywood Reporter, and in July 2026 Marvel Studios announced him as the new Ghost Rider, again with Levy directing, as CNN reported.

For most of his career Gosling avoided brand deals altogether. That changed in 2021, when he signed with the Swiss watchmaker TAG Heuer as a global ambassador, fronting campaigns for its Carrera line; the brand describes the partnership on its TAG Heuer ambassador page. It was widely described as his first-ever brand partnership. The commercial terms have never been disclosed, and no other long-running endorsement is on the public record, which suggests that advertising contributes far less to his income than film work does.

Gosling’s business interests are modest by the standards of many stars. The most visible is Tagine, a small Moroccan restaurant on Robertson Boulevard in Beverly Hills that he co-owns with chef Abdessamad “Ben” Benameur, which KTLA has profiled. He has also developed a producing career alongside his acting, taking a producer credit on “Project Hail Mary” from the moment MGM acquired the rights in 2020, as Variety reported at the time. In music he formed the band Dead Man’s Bones with Zach Shields, releasing an album in 2009; it was a creative sideline rather than a commercial one.

Gosling keeps his property holdings unusually private. Local press reported in 2021 that he and his partner, the actor Eva Mendes, had sold a house in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles, but no major outlet published verified sale details, and the couple have not publicly discussed where they now live. His known assets are therefore his restaurant stake, his producing interests and the accumulated income from two decades of film work, rather than a documented property portfolio.