Cleo Diára (she/her) was born on September 2, 1987, in Praia, Cape Verde. She moved to Lisbon during her childhood, where she completed most of her education. Her first theatrical experiences were with the university theatre group Miscutem, and it was following this that she began her professional artistic training in 2012 at ESTC – the Lisbon Theatre and Film School.
A multidisciplinary artist, since 2015 she has performed in several theatre projects by national directors, including Mário Coelho, Mónica Calle, Pedro Baptista, Rogério Carvalho, and Sónia Baptista. In 2020, she was awarded the Amélia Rey Colaço Grant to create the show Aurora Negra, in collaboration with actresses Isabel Zuaa and Nádia Yracema, which premiered at TNDMII (Lisbon) which counts with more than 30 presentations in Portugal and abroad.

In 2022, the collective AURORA NEGRA presented its second creation, Cosmos, on the main stage of TNDMII, and in 2023, Missão da Missão at TBA (Lisbon). In addition to her theatre work, she has also taken part in various national and international film productions, including Diamantino by Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt, Verão Danado and Entroncamento by Pedro Cabeleira, Terra Amarela by Dinis Costa, Nha Mila by Denise Fernandes, O Vento Assobiando nas Gruas by Jean Waltz, among others.

Cleo Diára received the Best Actress award in the Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival (2025) for the film O Riso e a Faca, directed by Pedro Pinho.