Philippe Noiret
| Philippe Noiret | |
|---|---|
 Philippe Noiret in 2003. | |
| Born |
1 October 1930 Lille, Nord, France |
| Died |
23 November 2006 (aged 76) Paris, France |
| Years active | 1948–2006 |
| Spouse(s) | Monique Chaumette (1958–2006; his death) |
| Awards |
Best Actor in a Leading Role 1976 Le Vieux fusil 1990 La Vie et rien d'autre' |
Philippe Noiret (French pronunciation: [filip nwaʁɛ]; 1 October 1930 – 23 November 2006) was a French film actor.
Life and career
Noiret was born in Lille, France, the son of Lucy (Heirman) and Pierre Noiret, a clothing company representative.[1] He was an indifferent scholar and attended several prestigious Paris schools, including the Lycée Janson de Sailly. He failed several times to pass his baccalauréat exams, so he decided to study theater. He trained at the Centre Dramatique de l'Ouest and toured with the Théâtre National Populaire for seven years, where he met Monique Chaumette, whom he married in 1962. During that time he developed a career as a nightclub comedian in a duo act with Jean-Pierre Darras, in which he played Louis XIV in an extravagant wig opposite Darras as the dramatist Jean Racine. In these roles they satirized the politics of Charles de Gaulle, Michel Debré and André Malraux.
Noiret's screen debut (1949) was an uncredited role in Gigi. In 1955 he appeared in La Pointe Courte directed by Agnès Varda. She said later - "I discovered in him a breadth of talent rare in a young actor." Sporting a pudding-basin haircut, Noiret played a lovelorn youth in the southern fishing port of Sète. He later admitted : "I was scared stiff, and fumbled my way through the part - I am totally absent in the film." He was not cast again until 1960 in Zazie dans le Métro. After playing second leads in Georges Franju's Thérèse Desqueyroux in 1962, and in Le Capitaine Fracasse, from Théophile Gautier's romantic adventure, he became a regular on the French screen, without being cast in major roles until A Matter of Resistance directed by Jean-Paul Rappeneau in 1966. He became a star in France with Yves Robert's Alexandre le Bienheureux
"When I began to have success in the movies," Noiret told film critic Joe Leydon at the Cannes Film Festival in 1989, "it was a big surprise for me. For actors of my generation—all the men of 50 or 60 now in French movies—all of us were thinking of being stage actors. Even people like Jean-Paul Belmondo, all of us, we never thought we'd become movie stars. So, at the beginning, I was just doing it for the money, and because they asked me to do it. But after two or three years of working on movies, I started to enjoy it, and to be very interested in it. And I'm still very interested in it, because I've never really understood how it works. I mean, what is acting for the movies? I've never really understood."[2]
Noiret was cast primarily as the Everyman character, although he did not hesitate to accept controversial roles, such as in La Grande Bouffe, a film about suicide by overeating, which caused a scandal at Cannes in 1973, and in 1991 André Téchiné cast Noiret in J'embrasse pas (I Don't Kiss), as a melancholy old homosexual obsessed with young male flesh. And in 1987, in The Gold Rimmed Glasses based on Giorgio Bassani's novel about the cramped social life of post-war Ferrara in Italy, he played an elderly and respectable doctor who is gradually suspected of being a covert homosexual with a passion for a beautiful young man (Rupert Everett). Noiret won his first César Award for his role in Vieux Fusil in 1976. His second César came in 1990 for his role in Life and Nothing But.
Noiret appeared in Hollywood-financed films by Alfred Hitchcock (Topaz), George Cukor (Justine), Ted Kotcheff (Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?), Peter Yates (Murphy's War) and Anatole Litvak (The Night of the Generals). But he may be best known for his roles as Alfredo in Cinema Paradiso (1988), Pablo Neruda in Il Postino, and Major Dellaplane in Bertrand Tavernier's Life and Nothing But.[3]
By the time of his death from cancer in Paris in 2006, aged 76, Noiret had more than 100 film roles to his credit. He often joked with interviewers about his virtually non-stop work schedule, telling Joe Leydon in 1989: "You never know what will be the success of a film. And it's always comfortable to be making another film when you're reading terrible notices for your last film. You can say, 'Well, that's a pity, but I'm already working on another job.' It helps in your living. You see, if you're only making one film a year, or one film every year and a half, it's hard. Because when it's a failure, what do you do? What do you become? You're dead.”[2]
Awards
- BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role
- 1990 - Nuovo Cinema Paradiso
- César Award for Best Actor
Selected filmography
| Year | Title | Role | Director |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1949 | Gigi | uncredited | Jacqueline Audry |
| 1950 | Olivia | ||
| 1952 | Agence matrimoniale | uncredited | Jean-Paul Le Chanois |
| 1956 | La Pointe courte (aka The Short Point) | Lui | Agnès Varda |
| 1960 | Zazie dans le Métro | Uncle Gabriel | Louis Malle |
| 1961 | Captain Fracasse | Hérode | Pierre Gaspard-Huit |
| 1962 | Comme un poisson dans l'eau (aka Like a Fish in the Water) | Lucien Barlemont | André Michel |
| Le Crime ne paie pas | Clovis Hugues | Gérard Oury | |
| Thérèse Desqueyroux | Bernard Desqueyroux | Georges Franju | |
| 1964 | Les Copains (aka The Buddies ) | Bénin | Yves Robert |
| 1965 | Lady L | Ambroise Gérôme | Peter Ustinov |
| A Matter of Resistance | Jérôme | Jean-Paul Rappeneau | |
| 1966 | Tendre Voyou | Bibi Dumonceaux | Jean Becker |
| Who Are You, Polly Maggoo? | Jean-Jacques Georges | William Klein | |
| 1967 | Night of the Generals | Inspector Morand | Anatole Litvak |
| 1968 | Alexandre le bienheureux | Alexandre | Yves Robert |
| 1969 | Mr. Freedom | Cameo appearance | William Klein |
| The Assassination Bureau | Monsieur Lucoville | Basil Dearden | |
| Justine | Pombal | George Cukor | |
| Clérambard | Hector de Clérambard | Yves Robert | |
| Topaz | Henri Jarré | Alfred Hitchcock | |
| 1971 | Murphy's War | Louis Brezon | Peter Yates |
| La Mandarine | Georges | Édouard Molinaro | |
| 1972 | La Vieille Fille (aka The Old Maid) | Gabriel Marcassus | Jean-Pierre Blanc |
| A Time for Loving | Marcel Dutarte-Dubreuilh | Christopher Miles | |
| L'Attentat (aka Plot) | Pierre Garcin | Yves Boisset | |
| 1973 | La Grande Bouffe | Philippe | Marco Ferreri |
| 1974 | Touche pas à la femme blanche! (aka Don't Touch the White Woman!) | General Terry | Marco Ferreri |
| L'Horloger de Saint-Paul (aka The Clockmaker) | Michel Descombes | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| Les Gaspards | Gaspard de Montfermeil | Pierre Tchernia | |
| Le Secret (aka The Secret) | Thomas Berthelot | Robert Enrico | |
| 1975 | Amici miei (aka My Friends) | Giorgio Perozzi | Mario Monicelli |
| Le vieux fusil (aka The Old Gun) | Julien Dandieu | Robert Enrico | |
| Que la fête commence (aka Let Joy Reign Supreme) | Philippe II, Duke of Orléans | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| 1976 | Une Femme à sa Fenêtre (aka A Woman at Her Window) | Raoul Malfosse | Pierre Granier-Deferre |
| Le Juge et l'Assassin (aka The Judge and the Assassin) | Judge Rousseau | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| Il deserto dei Tartari (aka The Desert of the Tartars) | The General | Valerio Zurlini | |
| Il comune senso del pudore | Giuseppe Costanzo | Alberto Sordi | |
| 1977 | The Purple Taxi | Philippe Marcal | Yves Boisset |
| Tendre Poulet | Antoine Lemercier | Philippe de Broca | |
| 1978 | Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? | Moulineau | Ted Kotcheff |
| Le Témoin (aka The Witness) | Robert Maurisson | Jean-Pierre Mocky | |
| 1979 | Due pezzi di pane (aka Happy Hobos) | Peppe Dorè | Sergio Citti |
| 1980 | Pile ou Face | Louis Baroni | Robert Enrico |
| On a volé la cuisse de Jupiter (aka Jupiter's Thigh) | Antoine Lemercier | Philippe de Broca | |
| 1981 | Tre fratelli (aka Three Brothers) | Raffaele Giuranna | Francesco Rosi |
| Il faut tuer Birgitt Haas | Athanase | Laurent Heynemann | |
| Coup de Torchon | Lucien Cordier | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| 1982 | L'étoile du nord (aka North Star) | Edouard Binet | Pierre Granier-Deferre |
| Amici miei - Atto IIº (aka All My Friends Part 2) | Giorgio Perozzi | Mario Monicelli | |
| 1983 | L'Africain | Victor | Philippe de Broca |
| L'Ami de Vincent (aka A Friend of Vincent) | Albert Palm | Pierre Granier-Deferre | |
| 1984 | Fort Saganne | Dubreuilh | Alain Corneau |
| Les Ripoux (aka My New Partner) | René Boisrond | Claude Zidi | |
| Qualcosa di biondo (aka Aurora) | Dr. André Feretti | Maurizio Ponzi | |
| 1985 | L'Été prochain (aka Next Summer) | Edouard | Nadine Trintignant |
| Le Quatrième Pouvoir | Yves Dorget | Serge Leroy | |
| 1986 | Speriamo che sia femmina (aka Let's Hope It's a Girl) | Count Leonardo | Mario Monicelli |
| 1987 | La famiglia (aka The Family) | Jean Luc | Ettore Scola |
| Masques (aka Masks) | Christian Legagneur | Claude Chabrol | |
| Gli occhiali d'oro (aka The Gold Rimmed Glasses) | Doctor Athos Fadigati | Giuliano Montaldo | |
| Noyade interdite (aka Widow's Walk) | Inspecteur Paul Molinat | Pierre Granier-Deferre | |
| 1988 | Il frullo del passero | Gabriele Battistini | Gianfranco Mingozzi |
| Chouans! | Savinien de Kerfadec | Philippe de Broca | |
| Young Toscanini | Dom Pedro II | Franco Zeffirelli | |
| 1989 | The Return of the Musketeers | Cardinal Mazarin | Richard Lester |
| Nuovo Cinema Paradiso | Alfredo | Giuseppe Tornatore | |
| La Vie et Rien D'autre (aka Life and Nothing But) | Commander Dellaplane | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| 1990 | Ripoux contre ripoux (aka My New Partner II) | René Boisrond | Claude Zidi |
| Dimenticare Palermo (aka The Palermo Connection) | Gianni Mucci | Francesco Rosi | |
| Uranus | Watrin | Claude Berri | |
| 1991 | J'embrasse pas (aka I Do Not Kiss) | Romain | André Téchiné |
| Especially on Sunday | Amleto | Giuseppe Tornatore | |
| Rossini! Rossini! | Gioachino Rossini | Mario Monicelli | |
| 1992 | Max et Jérémie | Robert Maxendre | Claire Devers |
| 1993 | Tango | François d'Amour | Patrice Leconte |
| 1994 | Il Postino: The Postman | Pablo Neruda | Michael Radford |
| La Fille de d'Artagnan (aka Revenge of the Musketeers) | d'Artagnan | Bertrand Tavernier | |
| Grosse Fatigue | as himself | Michel Blanc | |
| 1995 | Facciamo paradiso | Father of Claudia | Mario Monicelli |
| Les Milles | the General | Sébastien Grall | |
| 1996 | Les Grands Ducs | Victor Vialat | Patrice Leconte |
| Fantôme avec chauffeur | Philippe Bruneau-Teissier | Gérard Oury | |
| Balthus Through the Looking Glass | as himself | Damian Pettigrew | |
| 1997 | Soleil (aka Sun) | Joseph Lévy | Roger Hanin |
| Les Palmes de M. Schutz | Monsieur Schutz | Claude Pinoteau | |
| Le Bossu (aka On Guard) | Philippe d'Orléans | Philippe de Broca | |
| Marianna Ucrìa | Duca Signoretto | Roberto Faenza | |
| 2002 | Step by Step | Louis Chevalier | Philippe Blasband |
| Les Côtelettes (aka The Chops) | Léonce Grison | Bertrand Blier | |
| Père et Fils | Léo | Michel Boujenah | |
| 2003 | Ripoux 3 | René Boisrond / Jean Morzini | Claude Zidi |
| 2007 | Trois amis | Serano | Michel Boujenah |
References
- ↑ "Philippe Noiret Biography (1930-)". filmreference.com.
- 1 2 MovingPictureBlog.com, 23 November 2006
- ↑ EW.com, 27 November 2006
External links
- Philippe Noiret at the Internet Movie Database
- Guardian obituary
- Times obituary
- Philippe Noiret at Find a Grave