Ziva David walked into NCIS in the season 3 premiere “Kill Ari (Part 1)” and stayed through season 11 — Mossad liaison, later agent, fan favorite across roughly 194 episodes, with a 2019 return that hit like a delayed reunion.
Cote de Pablo made the Israeli operator look lived-in. She’s Chilean by birth: María José de Pablo Fernández, born in Santiago, raised in the U.S. from age 10. An ALMA Award–winning Carnegie Mellon grad, she’s so tied to Ziva that it’s easy to forget she was on camera long before Donald P. Bellisario and Don McGill launched the franchise.
Superfans already know the twist: as a teenager on Univision, she looked softer, younger — same eyes, different era.
Teen co-host on Control
Before Hollywood clocked her, 15-year-old Cote co-hosted episodes of the Latin American talk show Control opposite Carlos Ponce (later of Entertainment Tonight). It was her first on-screen credit — and it happened before she trained in Carnegie Mellon’s theater program.
After graduating with a BFA, she did the New York grind: restaurant shifts, Public Theater work, a small part on All My Children. The résumé was building. A network lead was next.
Two early drama cameos
After Control wrapped in 1995, she went quiet on TV for a stretch. In 2000 she resurfaced as Fiona on Fox’s brokerage drama The $treet — a one-episode girlfriend in a fashion-show mess, on a series that aired only seven of twelve produced episodes.
The next year she guested as Gina on CBS’s The Education of Max Bickford, opposite Richard Dreyfuss. One episode. Another brick in the wall.
The Jury almost was the break
In 2004, Fox cast her as Marguerite Cisneros, a lead on legal drama The Jury — twelve strangers deciding capital cases in New York. The premise had legs; the ratings didn’t. Ten episodes, then cancelation.
It stung. It also cleared the path. CBS came calling with a role that would define her: Ziva David on NCIS. Some storm clouds really do open onto something bigger.
Why the young face still matters
Put a Control-era still next to Season 3 Ziva and you see the same performer — just not the Mossad armor yet. The teen host, the waitressing years, the short-lived Fox lead: that’s the runway. Ziva made her famous. The kid on Univision is how she started.
