Maria Amalia "Melina" Mercouri (Greek: Μαρία Αμαλία "Μελίνα" Μερκούρη) was a Greek actress, singer, and politician. She received an Oscar nomination and won a Cannes Film Festival Award for her performance in the 1960 film Never on Sunday. Mercouri was also nominated for three Golden Globes and two BAFTA Awards in her acting career.
At the time of the coup d'état in Greece by a group of colonels of the Greek military on 21 April 1967, she was in the United States, playing in Illya Darling. She immediately joined the struggle against the Junta and started an international campaign, travelling all over the world to inform the public and contribute to the isolation and fall of the colonels. As a result, the dictatorial regime revoked her Greek citizenship and confiscated her property.
When her citizenship was taken away, she said: "I was born a Greek and I will die a Greek. Those bastards were born fascists and they will die fascists".
She went on to have a long and significant rôle in the democratically elected Greek government.