Oscar-winning Chilean director Sebastián Lelio dies at 52, family says

The announcement

Sebastián Lelio died on Friday, 6 November 2026, at the age of 52, his family said in a statement that cited health reasons without giving further details. His partner, Amalia Kassai, announced the death in a post on Instagram. Local media reports cited by El Periódico and EL PAÍS said he was found dead at his home in Las Condes, a district of Santiago. The family's statement described him as someone who contributed to Chilean culture at important moments in its history and said his memory would remain with them.

Early life and career

Lelio was born on 8 March 1974 in Mendoza, Argentina, and moved to Viña del Mar, Chile, at the age of two with his Chilean mother, Valeria. He made his feature debut with La sagrada familia (2006), followed by Navidad (2009) and El año del tigre (2011), according to EL PAÍS. The same outlet described his films as focused on identity, freedom and human relationships, with particular attention to social tensions. In a 2018 interview with Clarín, he said he was born in Argentina but was technically not Argentine and considered himself Chilean. In 2024 he led a petition against Javier Milei's plans to cut funding to Argentina's national film and audiovisual institute, the Incaa.

Breakthrough and Oscar

Gloria (2013), starring Paulina García, premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival, where García received the festival's best actress prize, a Silver Bear according to El Periódico. His next film, A Fantastic Woman (Una mujer fantástica), starring Daniela Vega, won the Oscar for best foreign-language film in 2018. El Periódico and EL PAÍS both reported that it was the first Chilean film to win that award. EL PAÍS described the film as following a trans woman who fights to defend her dignity against discrimination. His international projects followed, including Disobedience (2017) with Rachel Weisz and Rachel McAdams, Gloria Bell (2018) with Julianne Moore, and The Wonder (El prodigio, 2022) with Florence Pugh. In 2025 he released La ola, a musical inspired by the feminist mobilisations that swept Chilean universities in 2018.

Work in progress

Before his death, reports said Lelio was working on an adaptation of Poeta chileno, the novel by Alejandro Zambra. El Periódico reported that he was in Santiago filming that adaptation. EL PAÍS reported that he had been working on it, and it described the project as one of his most recent undertakings. The family's statement did not specify the health condition, and no article in the group reported a cause of death beyond that statement. The announcements and local reports together remain the only confirmed details of the death.