Catherine Deneuve

Catherine Deneuve (born October 22, 1943, Paris, France) is a French actress noted for her archetypal Gallic beauty as well as for her roles in films by some of the world’s greatest directors.

Deneuve was the third of four daughters born to the French actors Maurice Dorléac and Renée Deneuve. She landed a small role in the 1957 film Les Collégiennes (The Twilight Girls) and began her film career in earnest in 1960 with an appearance in Les Petits Chats (“The Little Cats,” released in English as Wild Roots of Love). She became an international star with her acclaimed performance in director Jacques Demy’s romantic classic Les Parapluies de Cherbourg (1964; The Umbrellas of Cherbourg).

During the 1960s and ’70s, Deneuve was in great demand by several of the world’s leading directors, such as Roman Polanski (Repulsion, 1965) and Terence Young (Mayerling, 1968). She worked for Luis Buñuel on the highly acclaimed French-Italian coproduction Belle de jour (1967) and the equally acclaimed French-Italian-Spanish coproduction Tristana (1970). She appeared sporadically in American films, perhaps most memorably in The April Fools (1969) with Jack Lemmon and in Hustle (1975) with Burt Reynolds.

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Despite her international résumé, most of Deneuve’s films were made in France. She worked with François Truffaut in La Sirène du Mississippi (1969; Mississippi Mermaid) and Le Dernier Métro (1980; The Last Metro) and also appeared in Demy’s Peau d’éâne (1970; Donkey Skin), Jean-Pierre Melville’s Un Flic (1971; Dirty Money), and Claude Berri’s Je vous aime (1980; I Love You All).

Her films of the 1990s included Indochine (1992), for which she received an Academy Award nomination for best actress, and O convento (1995; The Convent), which was directed by acclaimed Portuguese filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira. Deneuve enjoyed the film Breaking the Waves (1996) so much that she asked its director, Lars von Trier, for a part in one of his films. The result was her supporting role as a factory worker and confidant to the lead character (played by Björk) in Dancer in the Dark (2000).

Among her notable work in the early 21st century was a bravura performance at the head of a star-studded cast in François Ozon’s 8 Femmes (2002; 8 Women) and smaller roles in Oliveira’s Je rentre à la maison (2001; I’m Going Home) and Une Filme falado (2003; A Talking Picture). She later reteamed with Ozon for the farcical comedy Potiche (2010). Deneuve starred as a woman who embarks upon a road trip after a love affair dissolves in Elle s’en va (2013; On My Way) and evinced incipient mental illness in Dans la cour (2014; In the Couryard). She played a casino owner whose daughter disappears amid an attempted takeover of her business in the true-crime thriller L’Homme qu’on aimait trop (2014; In the Name of My Daughter). La Tête haute (2015; Standing Tall) featured Deneuve as a family court judge attempting to steer a juvenile delinquent away from self-destruction. Her films from 2017 included Sage femme (The Midwife), in which she played a hard-living gambler with brain cancer. Among Deneuve’s later credits were Mauvaises herbes (2018; Bad Seeds) and La vérité (2019; The Truth).

In addition to the fame she accrued for her beauty and talent, Deneuve also attracted attention for her relationships with director Roger Vadim and actor Marcello Mastroianni. Both relationships produced children, including actress Chiara Mastroianni, with whom Deneuve performed in several films, including the Demy-inspired musical Les Bien-Aimés (2011; Beloved) and 3 Coeurs (2014; 3 Hearts). Deneuve’s older sister, Françoise Dorléac, was also a successful actress. The sisters appeared together in one film, Demy’s Les Demoiselles de Rochefort (1967; The Young Girls of Rochefort).

In 2018 Deneuve was the recipient of the Japan Art Association’s prestigious Praemium Imperiale prize for theatre/film.