François Ozon (born 15 November 1967) is a French film director and screenwriter whose films are usually characterized by sharp satirical wit and a freewheeling view on human sexuality.

He has achieved international acclaim for his films 8 femmes (2002) and Swimming Pool (2003). Ozon is considered to be one of the most important French film directors in the new "New Wave" in French cinema such as Jean-Paul Civeyrac, Philippe Ramos, and Yves Caumon, as well as a group of French filmmakers associated with a "cinema du corps/cinema of the body".

​François Ozon est un réalisateur, scénariste et producteur français, né à Paris le 15 novembre 1967.

Il a été six fois nommé au César du meilleur film et du meilleur réalisateur.

​François ​Ozon was born in Paris, France. Having studied directing at the French film school La Femis, Ozon made several short films such as A Summer Dress (Une robe d'été, 1996) and Scènes de lit (1998). His motion picture directing debut was Sitcom (1998), which was well received by both critics and audiences.

After the Fassbinder adaptation Water Drops on Burning Rocks (Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes, 2000) came the film which made his name known outside France, 8 Women (8 femmes, 2002), starring Catherine Deneuve, Fanny Ardant, Isabelle Huppert and Emmanuelle Béart. With its quirky mix of musical numbers and murder mystery and a production design harking back to 1950s Hollywood melodramas such as those directed by Douglas Sirk, the film became a huge commercial success.

In 2003, Swimming Pool, which starred Charlotte Rampling and Ludivine Sagnier was released. It was considered by Ozon as a very personal film that gives insight into the difficult process of writing a novel or screenplay.

In 2004 he directed the film 5x2. In 2005 his film Time to Leave (Le Temps qui reste) was screened at various film festivals worldwide.

Ozon's first full English-language production Angel, starring Romola Garai, was released in early 2007. The film, based on a novel by British writer Elizabeth Taylor, follows the story of a poor girl who climbs Edwardian England's social ladder by becoming a romance writer. The film was shot at Tyntesfield House and Estate near Bristol, at other UK locations and in Belgium.

While filming Angel, Ozon developed a strong friendship with Garai and called her his "muse".

On 19 December 2011 Ozon was announced as being on the jury for the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival, which was held in February 2012.

His 2013 film Young & Beautiful (Jeune & Jolie) was nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. Ozon was elected as best screenwriter at the 2013 European Film Awards for his 2012 film In the House(Dans la maison).

François Ozon est né d'un biologiste et d'une professeure de français, dans une famille de quatre enfants. Il a reçu une éducation catholique.

Il rencontre à Paris Philippe Rombi qui écrit des compositions musicales pour des élèves de la Femis en parallèle de ses études au CNSMDP. Il signe ensuite la quasi-totalité des bandes originales de films de François Ozon.

En 2003, François Ozon fonde la société de production FOZ5, qui coproduit la plupart de ses films.

En 2012, François Ozon est membre du jury de la 62e édition du Festival international du film de Berlin, présidée par Mike Leigh. La même année, il obtient la Coquille d'or au 60e Festival de Saint-Sébastien pour Dans la maison, une histoire de vampirisation d’un professeur de français par un élève surdoué.

Les longs métrages d'Ozon démontrent une grande cinéphilie et procèdent par citations visuelles, de Jean-Luc Godard à Claude Chabrol, en passant par François Truffaut, Alain Resnais, Douglas Sirk, Luchino Visconti, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Billy Wilder, Pedro Almodóvar ou encore Rainer Werner Fassbinder dont il adapte une pièce avec Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes.

Il tourne un film par an en moyenne et aime explorer divers genres qu'il mêle parfois : drame intimiste, mélodrame, film fantastique, comédie, film policier, comédie musicale, film noir, thriller ou film à costume. Ses scénarios s'attachent à relater le voyage intérieur de ses protagonistes, majoritairement féminins, qui se trouvent confrontés à la difficulté d'affirmer leurs désirs dans une société normative ou violente. Dans sa manière de filmer, Ozon alterne réalisme et artificialité revendiquée. Il a souvent recours à une forme de stylisation extrême (décors, costumes, manière de filmer, musique) pour faire émerger une vérité cachée sur ses personnages et jouer sur la confusion du vrai et du faux.

Fred Astaire (born Frederick Austerlitz; May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987) was an American actor, dancer, singer, choreographer, and television presenter. He is widely considered the greatest dancer in film history.

His stage and subsequent film and television careers spanned a total of 76 years. He starred in more than 10 Broadway and West End musicals, made 31 musical films, four television specials, and numerous recordings. As a dancer, his outstanding traits were an uncanny sense of rhythm, perfectionism, and innovation. His most memorable dancing partnership was with Ginger Rogers, with whom he co-starred in a series of ten Hollywood musicals during the age of Classical Hollywood cinema, including Top Hat (1935), Swing Time (1936), and Shall We Dance (1937). Among the other notable films in which Astaire gained further popularity and took the genre of tap dancing to a new level were Holiday Inn (1942), Easter Parade (1948), The Band Wagon (1953), Funny Face (1957), and Silk Stockings (1957). The American Film Institute named Astaire the fifth-greatest male star of Classic Hollywood cinema in 100 Years... 100 Stars.

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As a result of their father's salesmanship, Fred and Adele landed a major contract and played the Orpheum Circuit in the Midwest, Western and some Southern cities in the US. Soon Adele grew to at least three inches taller than Fred, and the pair began to look incongruous. The family decided to take a two-year break from show business to let time take its course and to avoid trouble from the Gerry Society and the child labor laws of the time. The career of the Astaire siblings resumed with mixed fortunes, though with increasing skill and polish, as they began to incorporate tap dancing into their routines. Astaire's dancing was inspired by Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and John "Bubbles" Sublett. From vaudeville dancer Aurelio Coccia, they learned the tango, waltz, and other ballroom dances popularized by Vernon and Irene Castle.

By age 14, Fred had taken on the musical responsibilities for their act. He first met George Gershwin, who was working as a song plugger for Jerome H. Remick's music publishing company, in 1916. Their chance meeting was to affect the careers of both artists profoundly. Astaire was always on the lookout for new steps on the circuit and was starting to demonstrate his ceaseless quest for novelty and perfection.
​The Astaires broke into Broadway in 1917 with Over the Top, a patriotic revue, and performed for U.S. and Allied troops at this time as well. They followed up with several more shows.

Adele's sparkle and humor drew much of the attention, owing in part to Fred's careful preparation and sharp supporting choreography. She still set the tone of their act. But by this time, Astaire's dancing skill was beginning to outshine his sister's.

During the 1920s, Fred and Adele appeared on Broadway and the London stage. They won popular acclaim with the theater crowd on both sides of the Atlantic in shows such as Jerome Kern's The Bunch and Judy (1922), George and Ira Gershwin's Lady, Be Good (1924), Funny Face (1927) and later in The Band Wagon (1931). Astaire's tap dancing was recognized by then as among the best. For example, Robert Benchley wrote in 1930, "I don't think that I will plunge the nation into war by stating that Fred is the greatest tap-dancer in the world." Whilst in London, Fred studied piano at the Guildhall School of Music alongside his friend and colleague Noël Coward.

After the close of Funny Face, the Astaires went to Hollywood for a screen test at Paramount Pictures, but Paramount deemed them unsuitable for films.

They split in 1932 when Adele married her first husband, Lord Charles Cavendish, the second son of the 9th Duke of Devonshire.

In 1933, Fred Astaire married 25-year-old Phyllis Potter (formerly Phyllis Livingston Baker [1908–1954]), a Boston-born New York socialite and former wife of Eliphalet Nott Potter III (1906–1981), despite his mother's and sister's objections.

After the end of the partnership with his sister, Fred Astaire went on to achieve success on his own on Broadway and in London with Gay Divorce (later made into the film The Gay Divorcee) while considering offers from Hollywood.

Astaire and Rogers made nine films together at RKO. These included The Gay Divorcee (1934), Roberta (1935), Top Hat (1935), Follow the Fleet (1936), Swing Time (1936), Shall We Dance (1937), and Carefree (1938). Six out of the nine Astaire–Rogers musicals became the biggest moneymakers for RKO; Astaire received a percentage of the films' profits, something scarce in actors' contracts at that time.

Despite their success, Astaire was unwilling to have his career tied exclusively to any partnership. He negotiated with RKO to strike out on his own with A Damsel in Distress in 1937 with an inexperienced, non-dancing Joan Fontaine, unsuccessfully as it turned out. He returned to make two more films with Rogers, Carefree (1938) and The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939). While both films earned respectable gross incomes, they both lost money because of increased production costs, and Astaire left RKO, after being labeled "box office poison" by the Independent Theatre Owners of America. Astaire was reunited with Rogers in 1949 at MGM for their final outing, The Barkleys of Broadway, the only one of their films together to be shot in Technicolor.

​Astaire left RKO in 1939 to freelance and pursue new film opportunities, with mixed though generally successful outcomes. Throughout this period, Astaire continued to value the input of choreographic collaborators. Unlike the 1930s when he worked almost exclusively with Hermes Pan, he tapped the talents of other choreographers to innovate continually. His first post-Ginger dance partner was the redoubtable Eleanor Powell, considered the most exceptional female tap-dancer of her generation. They starred in Broadway Melody of 1940, in which they performed a celebrated extended dance routine to Cole Porter's "Begin the Beguine." In his autobiography Steps in Time, Astaire remarked, "She 'put 'em down' like a man, no ricky-ticky-sissy stuff with Ellie. She really knocked out a tap dance in a class by herself."

He played alongside Bing Crosby in Holiday Inn (1942) and later Blue Skies (1946). But, in spite of the enormous financial success of both, he was reportedly dissatisfied with roles where he lost the girl to Crosby. The former film is memorable for his virtuoso solo dance to "Let's Say it with Firecrackers". The latter film featured "Puttin' On the Ritz", an innovative song-and-dance routine indelibly associated with him. Other partners during this period included Paulette Goddard in Second Chorus (1940), in which he dance-conducted the Artie Shaw orchestra.

​He made two pictures with Rita Hayworth. The first film, You'll Never Get Rich (1941), catapulted Hayworth to stardom. In the movie, Astaire integrated for the third time Latin American dance idioms into his style. His second film with Hayworth, You Were Never Lovelier (1942), was equally successful. It featured a duet to Kern's "I'm Old Fashioned," which became the centerpiece of Jerome Robbins's 1983 New York City Ballet tribute to Astaire. He next appeared opposite the seventeen-year-old Joan Leslie in the wartime drama The Sky's the Limit (1943). In it, he introduced Arlen and Mercer's "One for My Baby" while dancing on a bar counter in a dark and troubled routine. Astaire choreographed this film alone and achieved modest box office success. It represented a notable departure for Astaire from his usual charming, happy-go-lucky screen persona, and confused contemporary critics.

His next partner, Lucille Bremer, was featured in two lavish vehicles, both directed by Vincente Minnelli. The fantasy Yolanda and the Thief (1945) featured an avant-garde surrealistic ballet. In the musical revue Ziegfeld Follies (1945), Astaire danced with Gene Kelly to the Gershwin song "The Babbit and the Bromide," a song Astaire had introduced with his sister Adele back in 1927. 

Always insecure and believing his career was beginning to falter, Astaire surprised his audiences by announcing his retirement during the production of his next film Blue Skies (1946). He nominated "Puttin' on the Ritz" as his farewell dance. After announcing his retirement in 1946, Astaire concentrated on his horse-racing interests and in 1947 founded the Fred Astaire Dance Studios, which he subsequently sold in 1966.

​Astaire's retirement did not last long. Astaire returned to the big screen to replace an injured Kelly in Easter Parade (1948) opposite Judy Garland, Ann Miller, and Peter Lawford. He followed up with a final reunion with Rogers (replacing Judy Garland) in The Barkleys of Broadway (1949). Both of these films revived Astaire's popularity and in 1950 he starred in more musicals including Three Little Words with Vera-Ellen, Royal Wedding (1951) with Jane Powell and Peter Lawford, The Belle of New York (1952) with Vera-Ellen, The Band Wagon (1953).

Soon after, Astaire, like the other remaining stars at MGM, was let go from his contract because of the advent of television and the downsizing of film production. In 1954, Astaire was about to start work on a new musical, Daddy Long Legs (1955) with Leslie Caron at 20th Century Fox. Then, his wife Phyllis became ill and suddenly died of lung cancer at the age of 46, ending their twenty-one years of blissful marriage and left Astaire devastated.

He wanted to shut down the picture and offered to pay the production costs out of his pocket. However, Johnny Mercer, the film's composer and Fox studio executives convinced him that work would be the best thing for him. Daddy Long Legs only did moderately well at the box office. His next film for Paramount, Funny Face (1957), teamed him with Audrey Hepburn and Kay Thompson. 

​Astaire did not retire from dancing altogether. He made a series of four highly-rated Emmy Award-winning musical specials for television in 1958, 1959, 1960, and 1968. Each featured Barrie Chase, with whom Astaire enjoyed a renewed period of dance creativity. The first of these programs, 1958's An Evening with Fred Astaire, won nine Emmy Awards, including "Best Single Performance by an Actor" and "Most Outstanding Single Program of the Year." It was also noteworthy for being the first major broadcast to be prerecorded on color videotape. Astaire won the Emmy for Best Single Performance by an Actor.

Astaire played Julian Osborne, a non-dancing character, in the nuclear war drama On the Beach (1959). He was nominated for a Golden Globe Best Supporting Actor award for his performance. Astaire appeared in non-dancing roles in three other films and several television series from 1957 to 1969.

Astaire's last major musical film was Finian's Rainbow (1968), directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Astaire shed his white tie and tails to play an Irish rogue who believes that if he buries a crock of gold in the shadows of Fort Knox the gold will multiply. Astaire's dance partner was Petula Clark, who played his character's skeptical daughter.

Astaire continued to act in the 1970s. In the movie The Towering Inferno (1974), he danced with Jennifer Jones and received his only Academy Award nomination, in the category of Best Supporting Actor. Astaire also appeared in the first two That's Entertainment! documentaries, in the mid-1970s. In the second compilation, aged seventy-six, he performed brief dance linking sequences with Kelly, his last dance performances in a musical film.

In 1979, He made a well publicized guest appearance on the science-fiction television series Battlestar Galactica, because of his grandchildren's interest in the series and the producers created an entire episode to feature him. This episode marked the final time that he danced on screen. His final film was the 1981 adaptation of Peter Straub's novel Ghost Story. This horror film was also the last for two of his most prominent castmates, Melvyn Douglas and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

Astaire revolutionized dance on film by having complete autonomy over its presentation. He is credited with two important innovations in early film musicals. First, he insisted that a closely tracking dolly camera film a dance routine in as few shots as possible, typically with just four to eight cuts, while holding the dancers in full view at all times. This gave the illusion of an almost stationary camera filming an entire dance in a single shot. Astaire's style of dance sequences allowed the viewer to follow the dancers and choreography in their entirety. Astaire maintained this policy from The Gay Divorcee in 1934 until his last film musical Finian's Rainbow in 1968, when director Francis Ford Coppola overruled him.

Astaire's second innovation involved the context of the dance; he was adamant that all song and dance routines be integral to the plotlines of the film. Instead of using dance as a spectacle as Busby Berkeley did, Astaire used it to move the plot along. Typically, an Astaire picture would include at least three standard dances. One would be a solo performance by Astaire, which he termed his "sock solo." Another would be a partnered comedy dance routine. Finally, he would include a partnered romantic dance routine.

​Astaire was a virtuoso dancer, able when called for to convey light-hearted venturesomeness or deep emotion. His technical control and sense of rhythm were astonishing. Long after the photography for the solo dance number "I Want to Be a Dancin' Man" was completed for the 1952 feature The Belle of New York, it was decided that Astaire's humble costume and the threadbare stage set were inadequate and the entire sequence was reshot. The 1994 documentary That's Entertainment! III shows the two performances side by side in split-screen. Frame for frame, the two performances are identical, down to the subtlest gesture.

Astaire's execution of a dance routine was prized for its elegance, grace, originality, and precision. He drew from a variety of influences, including tap and other black rhythms, classical dance, and the elevated style of Vernon and Irene Castle. His was a uniquely recognizable dance style that greatly influenced the American Smooth style of ballroom dance and set standards against which subsequent film dance musicals would be judged. He termed his eclectic approach "outlaw style," an unpredictable and instinctive blending of personal artistry. His dances are economical yet endlessly nuanced. As Jerome Robbins stated, "Astaire's dancing looks so simple, so disarming, so easy, yet the understructure, the way he sets the steps on, over or against the music, is so surprising and inventive."

According to Astaire himself:

“Working out the steps is a very complicated process—something like writing music. You have to think of some step that flows into the next one, and the whole dance must have an integrated pattern. If the dance is right, there shouldn't be a single superfluous movement. It should build to a climax and stop!”

His perfectionism was legendary, but his relentless insistence on rehearsals and retakes was a burden to some. When time approached for the shooting of a number, Astaire would rehearse for another two weeks and record the singing and music. With all the preparation completed, the actual shooting would go quickly, conserving costs. Astaire agonized during the process, frequently asking colleagues for acceptance for his work. As Vincente Minnelli stated, "He lacks confidence to the most enormous degree of all the people in the world. He will not even go to see his rushes... He always thinks he is no good."

​Although he viewed himself primarily as an entertainer, his artistry won him the admiration of twentieth-century dancers such as Gene Kelly, George Balanchine, the Nicholas Brothers, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Margot Fonteyn, Bob Fosse, Gregory Hines, Rudolf Nureyev, Michael Jackson, and Bill Robinson. Balanchine compared him to Bach, describing him as "the most interesting, the most inventive, the most elegant dancer of our times," while for Baryshnikov he was "a genius... a classical dancer like I never saw in my life." "No dancer can watch Fred Astaire and not know that we all should have been in another business," he concluded.

​Always immaculately turned out, he and Cary Grant were called "the best-dressed actor[s] in American movies." Astaire remained a male fashion icon even into his later years, eschewing his trademark top hat, white tie, and tails, which he hated. Instead, he favored a breezy casual style of tailored sport jackets, colored shirts, and slacks—the latter usually held up by the distinctive use of an old tie or silk scarf in place of a belt.

Intensely private, Fred Astaire was rarely seen on the Hollywood social scene. Instead, he devoted his spare time to his family and his hobbies, which included horse racing, playing the drums, songwriting, and golfing. In 1946, his horse Triplicate won the Hollywood Gold Cup and San Juan Capistrano Handicap. He remained physically active well into his eighties. He took up skateboarding in his late seventies and was awarded a life membership in the National Skateboard Society. At seventy-eight, he broke his left wrist while skateboarding in his driveway. He also had an interest in boxing and true crime.

He was good friends with David Niven, Randolph Scott, Clark Gable and Gregory Peck. Niven described him as "a pixie—timid, always warm-hearted, with a penchant for schoolboy jokes."

Fred Astaire died of pneumonia on June 22, 1987, at the age of 88. His body was buried at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, California. One of his last requests was to thank his fans for their years of support.

In addition to Phyllis Potter's son, Eliphalet IV (known as Peter), the Astaires had two children. The Astaires' son Fred Jr. (1936– ), appeared with his father in the movie Midas Run and later became a charter pilot and rancher. The Astaires' daughter Ava Astaire (1942– ) remains involved in promoting her father's legacy.

​Felipe VI or Philip VI (Felipe Juan Pablo Alfonso de Todos los Santos de Borbón y Grecia; born 30 January 1968) is the King of Spain. Felipe VI speaks Spanish, Catalan, French, English and some Greek. He ascended the throne on 19 June 2014 upon the abdication of his father, Juan Carlos I. His mother is Queen Sofía, and he has two elder sisters, Infanta Elena, Duchess of Lugo, and Infanta Cristina. In 2004, Felipe married TV news journalist Letizia Ortiz with whom he has two daughters, Leonor (his heir presumptive) and Sofía.

In accordance with the Spanish Constitution, as monarch, he is head of state and commander-in-chief of the Spanish Armed Forces with military rank of Captain General, and also plays the role of the supreme representation of Spain in international relations. 

Felipe VI was born at Our Lady of Loreto Hospital at Madrid, the third child and only son of Infante Juan Carlos and Princess Sofía of Greece and Denmark. He was baptised on 8 February 1968 at the Palace of Zarzuela by the Archbishop of Madrid, Casimiro Morcillo, with water from the Jordan River. His full baptismal name, Felipe Juan Pablo Alfonso de Todos los Santos, consists of the names of the first Bourbon king of Spain (Felipe V), his grandfathers (Infante Juan of Spain and King Paul of Greece), his great-grandfather King Alfonso XIII of Spain, and de Todos los Santos ("of all the Saints") as is customary among the Bourbons. His godparents were his paternal grandfather Juan and his paternal great-grandmother, Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain. Additionally, he is the third cousin once removed of Queen Elizabeth II, King Harald V, Queen Margrethe II, and King Carl XVI Gustav of the United Kingdom, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden respectively.

Shortly after Felipe's birth he was styled infante. The dictator Francisco Franco died just more than two months before Felipe's eighth birthday, and Felipe's father ascended the throne, as the latter had been appointed as Prince (heir presumptive of Franco) back in 1969. In his first official appearance, Felipe attended his father's proclamation as king on 22 November 1975.

In 1977, Felipe was formally proclaimed Prince of Asturias. In May, nine-year-old Felipe was made an honorary soldier of the 1st King's Immemorial Infantry Regiment. The occasion was marked on 28 May and was attended by the king, the prime minister and several other ministers in a ceremony at the infantry's barracks. On 1 November the same year, he was ceremoniously paid homage as Prince of Asturias in Covadonga.

In 1981 Felipe received the Collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece from his father, the Chief and Sovereign of the Order. On his 18th birthday on 30 January 1986, Felipe swore allegiance to the Constitution and to the King in the Spanish Parliament as required by the constitution, fully accepting his role as successor to the Crown.

Felipe attended school at Santa María de los Rosales, which his daughters currently attend. Felipe attended high school at Lakefield College School in Ontario, Canada, and studied at the Autonomous University of Madrid, where he graduated with a degree in Law; he also completed several courses in Economics. He completed his academic studies by obtaining a Master of Science in Foreign Service degree from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, where he was the roommate of his cousin, Crown Prince Pavlos of Greece.

Felipe's Juan Carlos became King in late November 1975, but no title was conferred on Felipe as heir apparent until 1977, when he was created Prince of Asturias, the traditional title normally held by the heir to the Spanish throne. The royal decree granting him this title also entitled him to use "the other historical titles corresponding to the heir of the Crown". Felipe started using the Aragonese title of Prince of Girona publicly on 21 April 1990, during a trip around Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia, becoming the first Bourbon to use this title.

Upon ascending the throne, Felipe assumed the same titles held by his father. If the former Kingdoms of Aragon and Navarre had separate naming styles, he would also be known as Felipe V of Aragon and Felipe VII of Navarre along with Felipe VI of Castile.
As the heir to the throne, a carefully regulated and structured plan was laid out for Felipe's military training. In August 1985, a Royal Decree named Felipe as officer at the General Military Academy in Zaragoza. He began his military training there in September. In September 1986, he began his naval training at the Escuela Naval Militar in Marin (Pontevedra), joining the Third Brigade. 

In September 1987, he began his air force training there where he learned to fly aircraft. As part of his military training, Felipe trained as a military helicopter pilot. In 1992, he was promoted to captain in the Air Force. In 1993, he was promoted to lieutenant in the Navy and captain in the Infantry of the Army. In 2009 he was promoted to colonel in the Army, frigate captain in the Navy, and lieutenant colonel in the Air Force.

Since 19 June 2014, after his ascension to the throne, he acquired the rank of Capitán General (Commander-in-chief) of all the Spanish armies (Land, Navy and Air Force).

Felipe undertook his constitutional duties as heir to the throne, hosting many official events in Spain and participating in all events of different sectors and aspects of Spanish public life. On occasions when King Juan Carlos I was unable to attend, Felipe presided over the annual presentation of dispatches to officers and non-commissioned officers in the Armed Forces as well as participating in military exercises held by the three Armed Services.

Felipe has also played an active role in promoting Spain's economic, commercial and cultural interests and the Spanish language abroad. He frequently represents Spain at world economic and trade events (e.g. Expotecnia, Expoconsumo, and Expohabitat), and is especially interested in promoting the creation of Centres and University Chairs to advance the study of Spain both historically and in the present-day at major foreign universities.

In addition to his official activities, Felipe serves as Honorary President of several associations and foundations, such as the Codespa Foundation, which finances economic and social development in Ibero-America and other countries, and the Spanish branch of the Association of European Journalists, comprising outstanding communications professionals. Most noteworthy is the Príncipe de Asturias Foundation, where he presides annually at the international awards ceremony of the highly prestigious Princess of Asturias Awards (formerly the Prince of Asturias Awards).

Felipe was appointed a "UN-Eminent Person" by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in 2001, during its International Year of Volunteers, and continues to make contributions internationally towards enhancing the importance of voluntary work. 

​In 2019 he received the World Peace & Liberty Award from the World Jurist Association at the World Law Congress in Madrid.

Felipe was a member of the Spanish Olympic sailing team at the Barcelona Games in 1992. He is also an honorable member of the International Soling Association. (Both his mother and uncle, King Konstantínos II of the Hellenes, were on the Greek sailing team at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, and Felipe's father and sister were also Olympic sailors for Spain.)

Felipe and Letizia have two daughters: Leonor, Princess of Asturias (born 31 October 2005) and Infanta Sofía (born 29 April 2007). Both were born at Ruber International Hospital in Madrid.

​On 2 June 2014, King Juan Carlos announced his intent to abdicate in Felipe's favour. As required by the Constitution of Spain, the Spanish Cabinet began deliberations the following day on an organic law to give effect to the abdication. Felipe ascended the throne at the stroke of midnight on 19 June.

The next morning, after receiving the Captain General's sash from his father, he was formally sworn in and proclaimed king in a low-key ceremony held in the Cortes. He swore to uphold the Constitution before formally being proclaimed king by Posada. Upon his accession, he became the youngest monarch in Europe, being nine months younger than King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands.

As heir to the Spanish throne, Felipe's arms were the Spanish arms differenced with a label of three points azure (blue). The first quarter represents Castile, the second León, the third Aragon, and the fourth Navarre; below are the arms of Granada. In the centre, on an inescutcheon, were the ancestral arms of the sovereign House of Bourbon-Anjou. Surrounding the shield was the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece and surmounting it was the heraldic crown of the heir to the throne, decorated with four half-arches.

Following his accession to the throne, the label on his arms was removed and the crown of the heir was changed to that of the monarch's (eight half-arches instead of four). These arms differ from those of his father's as king, as they omit the Cross of Burgundy, the yoke, and the sheaf of five arrows.