Miou-Miou
| Miou-Miou | |
|---|---|
 Miou-Miou in February 2013 | |
| Born |
Sylvette Herry 22 February 1950 Paris, France |
| Nationality | French |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1971–present |
| Children | 2 |
Miou-Miou (born Sylvette Herry on 22 February 1950) is a French actress. In her career she has worked with a number of international directors, including Michel Gondry, Bertrand Blier, Claude Berri, Jacques Deray, Patrice Leconte, Joseph Losey and Louis Malle. A 10-time César Award nominee, she won the César Award for Best Actress for the 1979 film Memoirs of a French Whore. Her other films include This Sweet Sickness (1977), Entre Nous (1983), May Fools (1990), Germinal (1993), Dry Cleaning (1997) and Arrêtez-moi (2013).
Career
She was born Sylvette Herry in Paris. Her stage name, Miou-Miou (a reference to the sound of a cat), was given to her by Coluche. She was raised in Paris by her mother, a greengrocer. After studying acting she worked in improvisational theater with Coluche and Patrick Dewaere, joining with them to help found the new comedy theatre Café de la Gare.[1] She made her film debut in La vie sentimentale de Georges Le Tueur and La Cavale (both 1971).[2]
She showed a mixture of innocence and strength in her roles. In 1973 she appeared in three films, Elle court, elle court la banlieue, Les granges brulées and Les aventures de Rabbi Jacob. Her big break came with Blier's Les Valseuses (Going Places), released in 1974. After her role in Les valseuses, she began getting leading roles in comedy and drama. Through the 1970s, she had roles in such films as F...Like Fairbanks (1976), Alain Tanner's Jonah Who Will Be 25 in the Year 2000 (1976), Losey's Roads to the South (1978) and La dérobade (Memoirs of a French Whore, 1979) directed by Daniel Duval, in which she portrayed a young prostitute. She received a César Award for that role. Many of these 1970s films were seen in North America in art-house venues. In 1976 she appeared in one of the last spaghetti westerns, Damiano Damiani's A Genius, Two Friends, and an Idiot.
She is known for her relationships with actor Patrick Dewaere, who is the father of her first child Angèle, and with the singer Julien Clerc, with whom she had a second daughter, Jeanne.
By 2006, she had 70 films to her credit. Through the 1980s she was in such films as La gueule du loup (1981), Guy de Maupassant (1982), Kurys' Entre nous (1983) with Isabelle Huppert, Blanche et Marie (1984), Evening Dress (1986), and Deville's La lectrice (The Reader, 1988). She played opposite Lee Marvin (in one of his last roles) in Boisset’s Dog Day in 1984.
The 1990s saw her in Louis Malle's May Fools (1990), Deray's thriller Netchaïev is back, the comedy Un indien dans la ville (1994), and The Eighth Day (1996) and Dry Cleaning in 1997. She appeared opposite Gérard Depardieu in a new production of Émile Zola's Germinal (1993). By now in her fifties, her film roles have abated, as she also began to appear in theatre.[1] 2001 saw her in Agathe et le grand magasin and in 2004 she appeared in L'après-midi de monsieur Andesmas, among other films.
Miou-Miou does not consider herself a "star". She was quoted as saying in 1989, "I turned down dinner with Mickey Rourke. Because he's a star. To me, a star is inaccessible, mysterious, an impossible dream — and should stay that way. Adjani's a star. Deneuve's a star. Not me".[3]
Filmography
| Year | Title | Role | Director | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1971 | La cavale | Little Squirrel | Michel Mitrani | |
| La vie sentimentale de Georges Le Tueur | Daniel Berger | Short | ||
| 1972 | Ça va, ça vient | Magic Circus's woman | Pierre Barouh | |
| 1973 | Quelques messieurs trop tranquilles | Anita Boucher | Georges Lautner | |
| Themroc | The young neighbor | Claude Faraldo | ||
| Elle court, elle court la banlieue | The assistant | Gérard Pirès | ||
| The Year 01 | The woman at 6 am | Jacques Doillon Alain Resnais Jean Rouch |
||
| The Burned Barns | Monique Cateux | Jean Chapot | ||
| The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob | Antoinette Pivert | Gérard Oury | ||
| 1974 | Going Places | Marie-Ange | Bertrand Blier | |
| Tender Dracula | Marie | Pierre Grunstein | ||
| 1975 | Lily, aime-moi | The girl in the coffee | Maurice Dugowson | |
| Pas de problème! | Anita Boucher | Georges Lautner (2) | ||
| A Genius, Two Partners and a Dupe | Lucy | Damiano Damiani Sergio Leone |
||
| 1976 | Al piacere di rivederla | Patrizia | Marco Leto | |
| Victory March | Rosanna | Marco Bellocchio | ||
| D'amour et d'eau fraîche | Rita Gonzalez | Jean-Pierre Blanc | ||
| F comme Fairbanks | Marie | Maurice Dugowson (2) | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress | |
| On aura tout vu | Christine | Georges Lautner (3) | ||
| Jonah Who Will Be 25 in the Year 2000 | Marie | Alain Tanner | ||
| 1977 | This Sweet Sickness | Juliette | Claude Miller | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress |
| 1978 | Les routes du sud | Julia | Joseph Losey | |
| 1979 | Traffic Jam | Angela | Luigi Comencini | |
| Bye, See You Monday | Nicole | Maurice Dugowson (3) | ||
| Memoirs of a French Whore | Marie | Daniel Duval | César Award for Best Actress | |
| 1980 | The Woman Cop | Inspector Corinne Levasseur | Yves Boisset | |
| 1981 | Est-ce bien raisonnable? | Julie Boucher | Georges Lautner (4) | |
| La gueule du loup | Marie | Michel Léviant | ||
| 1982 | Josepha | Josépha Manet | Christopher Frank | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress |
| Guy de Maupassant | Gisèle d'Estoc | Michel Drach | ||
| 1983 | Entre Nous | Madeleine | Diane Kurys | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress |
| Attention une femme peut en cacher une autre! | Alice | Georges Lautner (5) | ||
| 1984 | Dog Day | Jessica | Yves Boisset (2) | |
| Le vol du Sphinx | Laura | Laurent Ferrier | ||
| 1985 | Blanche et Marie | Blanche | Jacques Renard | |
| Une vie comme je veux | Laurence | Jean-Jacques Goron | TV Movie | |
| 1986 | Tenue de soirée | Monique | Bertrand Blier (2) | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress |
| 1988 | The Revolving Doors | Lauda | Francis Mankiewicz | Nominated - Genie Award for Best Supporting Actress |
| The Reader | Constance / Marie | Michel Deville | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress | |
| L'argent | Caroline Hamelin | Jacques Rouffio | TV Movie | |
| Un vrai bonheur | Jean-Marie Cornille | Short | ||
| 1990 | May Fools | Camille | Louis Malle | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress Nominated - David di Donatello for Best Foreign Actress |
| 1991 | Netchaïev est de retour | Brigitte | Jacques Deray | |
| La Totale! | Hélène Voisin | Claude Zidi | ||
| 1992 | Scènes de ménage | The woman | Claire Simon | Short |
| Le bal des casse-pieds | Louise Sherry | Yves Robert | ||
| 1993 | Tango | Marie | Patrice Leconte | |
| Germinal | Maheude | Claude Berri | Nominated - César Award for Best Actress | |
| 1994 | Montparnasse-Pondichéry | Julie | Yves Robert (2) | |
| Un indien dans la ville | Patricia | Hervé Palud | ||
| 1995 | Une femme dans la tourmente | Michèle Rouannet | Serge Moati | TV Movie |
| Une page d'amour | Hélène | Serge Moati (2) | TV Movie | |
| Court toujours: Joséphine et les gitans | Joséphine | Vincent Ravalec | TV Short | |
| 1996 | Ma femme me quitte | Joanna Martin | Didier Kaminka | |
| The Eighth Day | Julie | Jaco Van Dormael | ||
| 1997 | Dry Cleaning | Nicole Kunstler | Anne Fontaine | Lumières Award for Best Actress Nominated - César Award for Best Actress |
| Elles | Eva | Luís Galvão Teles | ||
| 1998 | Hors jeu | Herself | Karim Dridi | |
| 2000 | Tout va bien, on s'en va | Laure | Claude Mouriéras | |
| Pour une fois | Jérôme Bonnell | Short | ||
| 2001 | Agathe et le grand magasin | Agathe | Bertrand Arthuys | TV Movie |
| 2003 | Ambre a disparu | Eva Lorca | Denys Granier-Deferre | TV Movie |
| 2004 | Folle embellie | Alida | Dominique Cabrera | |
| Mariages! | Gabrielle | Valérie Guignabodet | ||
| L'après-midi de monsieur Andesmas | Michel Arc's wife | Michelle Porte | ||
| 2005 | L'un reste, l'autre part | Anne-Marie | Claude Berri (2) | |
| Riviera | Antoinette | Anne Villacèque | ||
| 2006 | The Science of Sleep | Christine Miroux | Michel Gondry | |
| Avril | Sister Bernadette | Gérald Hustache-Mathieu | ||
| Le héros de la famille | Simone Garcia | Thierry Klifa | ||
| 2007 | Les murs porteurs | Judith Rosenfeld | Cyril Gelblat | |
| 2008 | Affaire de famille | Laure Guignebont | Claus Drexel | |
| The Great Alibi | Éliane Pages | Pascal Bonitzer | ||
| Mia and the Migoo | Juliette's voice | Jacques-Rémy Girerd | ||
| 2009 | Marcher | Herself | Jeanne Herry | Short |
| Petites vacances à Knokke-le-Zoute | Micheline | Yves Matthey | TV Movie | |
| Pour un fils | Catherine | Alix De Maistre | ||
| Le Concert | Guylène de La Rivière | Radu Mihăileanu | ||
| Une petite zone de turbulences | Anne Muret | Alfred Lot | ||
| 2011 | Le grand restaurant II | A client | Gérard Pullicino | TV Movie |
| Le choix d'Adèle | Adèle | Olivier Guignard | TV Movie | |
| 2012 | Quand je serai petit | Jacqueline | Jean-Paul Rouve | |
| Bienvenue parmi nous | Alice | Jean Becker | ||
| Avanti | Catherine | Emmanuelle Antille | ||
| Populaire | Madeleine Échard | Régis Roinsard | ||
| 2013 | Arrêtez-moi | Pontoise | Jean-Paul Lilienfeld | |
| Bob et les Sex Pistaches | Yves Matthey (2) | |||
| Landes | Madeleine | François-Xavier Vives | ||