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Jeanne Moreau

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Jeanne Moreau
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(born Jan. 23, 1928, Paris, France) French film actress. At age 20 she became the youngest member of the Comédie-Française. She made her screen debut in The Last Love (1949) and won acclaim for her roles in Louis Malle's Frantic (1957) and The Lovers (1958). Though not conventionally beautiful, she became noted for her sensuality and sophistication. She starred in Moderato cantabile (1960), La notte (1961), and Jules et Jim (1961), playing a woman loved by two men in the movie that established her as an international star, and later in The Trial (1962), Diary of a Chambermaid (1964), and The Bride Wore Black (1968). She also directed films, including Lumière (1976) and L'Adolescente (1978).

For more information on Jeanne Moreau, visit Britannica.com.

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French Literature Companion: Jeanne Moreau
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Moreau, Jeanne (b. 1928). French actress who, having played opposite Gérard Philipe in Le Cid at the TNP, made a brilliant film career. She has worked for many of the major directors of the period (e.g. Truffaut, Jules et Jim; Duras, Nathalie Granger).

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Jeanne Moreau
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Moreau, Jeanne (zhän môrō'), 1928-, French movie actress, b. Paris. She studied at the Comédie Française. She is known for her sophisticated portrayals of amoral heroines. In Jules and Jim (1961), she etched a highly ambiguous portrait of a delightful woman capable of destroying the men who love her. Her films include The Lovers (1959), Les Liaisons Dangereuses (1960), La Notte (1961), Diary of a Chambermaid (1964), Going Places (1974), The Trout (1982), La Femme Nikita (1990), and The Summer House (1993). In 1976, she directed her first feature, Lumière.
Quotes By: Jeanne Moreau
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Quotes:

"Age does not protect you from love but love to some extent protects you from age."

"Some people are addicts. If they don't act, they don't exist."

"Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts he does not hide; he exposes himself."

Actor: Jeanne Moreau
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  • Born: Jan 23, 1928 in Paris, France
  • Occupation: Actor, Director, Writer
  • Active: '50s-2000s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Comedy Drama
  • Career Highlights: Le Feu Follet, Jules and Jim, La Femme Nikita
  • First Major Screen Credit: Dernier Amour (1948)

Biography

One of the most recognizable faces of the French cinema, and also one of its most celebrated, Jeanne Moreau is a legend in her own right. Combining off-kilter beauty with strong character, Moreau came to embody forthright, devil-may-care sensuality in such films as Jules and Jim and The Bride Wore Black. Comparing her to some of her best-known colleagues, Ginette Vincendeau noted, "Where Brigitte Bardot was sex and Catherine Deneuve elegance, Moreau incarnated intellectual femininity."

Born in Paris on January 23, 1928, Moreau was the daughter of an English dancer and a French barman who divorced when she was eleven. Growing up in Nazi-occupied Paris, she began to discover her love of literature and the theatre, and, opposing her father's wishes, she decided to become an actress. While still a student at the Paris Conservatoire, Moreau made her stage debut at the 1947 Avignon Theatre Festival. Shortly thereafter, she was invited to join the prestigious Comédie-Française, becoming on her twentieth birthday the youngest full-time member in the company's history. She stayed with the company for four years, appearing in almost all of their productions during that time. She left in 1951, finding it too restrictive and authoritarian, and joined the more experimental Théâtre Nationale Populaire.

During this time, Moreau began to take bit parts in various films, particularly B-movie melodramas. Initially not considered attractive enough to be a movie star--thanks in part to her lack of interest in make-up--she was fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of a director who found her natural attributes to be just what he was looking for: Louis Malle, who directed the actress in her breakthrough film, the New Wave murder mystery Ascenseur pour l'échafaud (Elevator to the Gallows) (1957). Following this film, Moreau remained Malle's favorite actress and off-screen lover for the next several years. The pair made headlines with their 1959 collaboration, Les Amants (The Lovers); the steamy tale of a bored housewife's extramarital affair pushed the boundaries of censorship on its U.S. release and led certain American gossip columnists to tag Moreau "the new Bardot." The actress' biggest international success was as the exuberant, free-spirited heroine of François Truffaut's Jules et Jim (1962); five years later, she worked again with Truffaut, starring as an icy murderess in the popular Hitchcock homage The Bride Wore Black (1967). Throughout the 1960s, Moreau worked with some of the cinema's most notable directors, collaborating with Peter Brooks on the 1960 Moderato Cantabile (for which she won a Best Female Performance award at the Cannes Film Festival), Michelangelo Antonioni on La Notte (1961), and Luis Buñuel on Le Journal d'une Femme de Chambre.

Throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, Moreau continued to work regularly, largely forgoing Hollywood fare in favor of European films. She made some of her more notable appearances in Bertrand Blier's Les Valseuses (1974), Luc Besson's La femme Nikita (1990), and Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World (1991). She also played minor but pivotal roles in The Lover (1992), to which she lent her sandpaper-and-whisky voice as the narrator; Antonioni's Beyond the Clouds (1995), in which she appeared with Marcello Mastroianni in one of his last roles; and Ever After (1998), one of her few Hollywood outings.

Linked romantically with dozens of high-profile men over the decades, Moreau was for a brief period married to Exorcist director William Friedkin. In addition to her acting pursuits, Moreau put her talents to use behind the camera, directing Lumière (1976) and L'adolescente (1979). She has also served twice as the president of the Cannes FIlm Festival jury (1975 and 1995) and has won a number of honors, including a Golden Lion for career achievement at the 1991 Venice Film Festival and a 1997 European Film Academy Lifetime Achievement Award. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
Wikipedia: Jeanne Moreau
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Jeanne Moreau

at the San Sebastian International Film Festival (2006)
Born 23 January 1928 (1928-01-23) (age 81)
Paris, France
Occupation Actress, screenwriter, film director
Years active 1947–present
Spouse(s) Jean-Louis Richard (1949–1951)
Teodoro Rubanis (m.1966)
William Friedkin (1977–1979)

Jeanne Moreau (French pronunciation: [ʒan mɔˈʁo]; born 23 January 1928) is a French actress, screenwriter and director.

She made her theatrical debut in 1947, and established herself as one of the leading actresses of the Comédie-Française. She began playing small roles in films in 1949 and eventually achieved prominence as the star of Elevator to the Gallows (1958), directed by Louis Malle and Jules et Jim (1962), directed by François Truffaut. Most prolific during the 1960s, Moreau continues to appear in films to the present day.

Moreau is the recipient of a César Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress and a Cannes Film Festival Best Actress Award for individual performances, and several lifetime awards.

Contents

Early life

Moreau was born in Paris, the daughter of Katherine (née Buckley), a dancer who performed at the Folies Bergère, and Anatole-Désiré Moreau, a restaurateur.[1][2] Moreau's father was French and her mother was English, a native of Lancashire, England and of part Irish descent.[2][3][4] Moreau's father was Catholic and her mother, originally a Protestant , converted to Catholicism upon marriage.[2] Moreau studied at the Conservatoire de Paris.

Career

In 1947, she made her theatrical debut at the Avignon Festival. By her twenties, Moreau was already one of leading stage actresses at the Comédie-Française.[2] After 1949, she began appearing in films with small parts. From the late 1950s, after appearing in several successes, she began to work with the emerging generation of French film-makers. Elevator to the Gallows (1958) with first-time director Louis Malle was followed by Malle's The Lovers (Les Amants, 1959). The latter film, controversial in its day, led the media to tag her 'The New Bardot'.

Largely thanks to those films, she went on to work with many of the best known New Wave and avant-garde directors.[2] François Truffaut's New Wave film Jules et Jim (1962), her biggest success internationally, is centred on her magnetic starring role.[2] She has also worked with a number of other notable directors such as Michelangelo Antonioni (La notte and Beyond the Clouds), Orson Welles (Chimes at Midnight), Luis Buñuel (Diary of a Chambermaid), Elia Kazan (The Last Tycoon), Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Querelle), Wim Wenders (Until the End of the World), and by Carl Foreman (Champion).

Moreau has enjoyed success as a vocalist. She has released several albums and once performed with Frank Sinatra at Carnegie Hall.[2] In addition to acting, Moreau has also worked behind the camera, as a writer, director and producer.[2] Her blended accomplishments were the subject of a 1988 film profile, Calling The Shots, by Janis Cole and Holly Dale.

Personal life

Throughout her life, she has maintained friendships with prominent writers such as Jean Cocteau, Jean Genet, Henry Miller, and Marguerite Duras (an interview with Moreau is included in Duras's book Outside: Selected Writings).

She has been married three times, to Jean-Louis Richard (1949-1951), Teodoro Rubanis (1966-1967), and William Friedkin (1977-1979). Director Tony Richardson left his wife, Vanessa Redgrave, for her in 1967, but they never married. She has also dated directors Louis Malle and François Truffaut and fashion designer Pierre Cardin[5].

She is a close friend of Sharon Stone, who presented a 1998 American Academy of Motion Pictures life tribute to Moreau. Orson Welles called her "the greatest actress in the world",[6] and to this day she remains one of France's most accomplished actresses.

Filmography

Actor

Director

  • Lumière (1976)
  • L'Adolescente (1979)
  • Lillian Gish (1983, TV documentary)

Awards and nominations

César Awards

Year Group Award Film Result
1992 César Awards Best Actress The Old Lady Who Walked in the Sea Won
Year Group Award Film Result
1987 César Awards Best Actress Le Paltoquet Nominated
1988 César Awards Best Actress Le Miraculé Nominated

Molière Awards

Year Group Award Film Result
1988 Molière Awards Best Actress Le Récit de la servante Zerline Won

References

  1. ^ Jeanne Moreau Biography (1928-)
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Stated in interview at Inside the Actors Studio
  3. ^ Famous French people of immigrant origin, Eupedia : France Guide
  4. ^ Jeanne Moreau Biography - Yahoo! Movies
  5. ^ http://www.gala.fr/les_stars/leurs_bio/jeanne_moreau
  6. ^ Salon.com People | Jeanne Moreau

External links

v • d • e
César Award for Best Actress
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1976 : Romy Schneider • 1977 : Annie Girardot • 1978 : Simone Signoret • 1979 : Romy Schneider • 1980 : Miou-Miou • 1981 : Catherine Deneuve • 1982 : Isabelle Adjani • 1983 : Nathalie Baye • 1984 : Isabelle Adjani • 1985 : Sabine Azéma • 1986 : Sandrine Bonnaire • 1987 : Sabine Azéma • 1988 : Anémone • 1989 : Isabelle Adjani • 1990 : Carole Bouquet • 1991 : Anne Parillaud • 1992 : Jeanne Moreau • 1993 : Catherine Deneuve • 1994 : Juliette Binoche • 1995 : Isabelle Adjani • 1996 : Isabelle Huppert • 1997 : Fanny Ardant • 1998 : Ariane Ascaride • 1999 : Élodie Bouchez • 2000 : Karin Viard • 2001 : Dominique Blanc • 2002 : Emmanuelle Devos • 2003 : Isabelle Carré • 2004 : Sylvie Testud • 2005 : Yolande Moreau • 2006 : Nathalie Baye • 2007 : Marina Hands • 2008 : Marion Cotillard • 2009 : Yolande Moreau

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

 
 
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Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
French Literature Companion. The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French. Copyright © 1995, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
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Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Jeanne Moreau".  Read more

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