Disappeared this Wednesday, April 13, the actor Michel Bouquet leaves an indelible mark in the French theater, but also in the cinema. In the foreground on stage, he is one of the greatest supporting roles in cinema, but not only. His unique voice, timbre and diction are also transposed into a recognizable silhouette among all, for François Truffaut, Claude Chabrol or Gérard Guédiguian.
“The bride was in black”
Co-initiator of the New Wave, François Truffaut entrusts Michel Bouquet in 1967 with the role of a freshly married man, shot dead at the exit of the church by the killers of a plot that has gone wrong. His widow, Jeanne Moreau, goes up the trail and applies her revenge, a pretext for evoking five visions of the ideal woman. The actor embodies one of his rare victim roles and imprints the film with a bourgeois elegance that will remain with him.
“The Unfaithful Wife”
It was the other troublemaker of the New Wave, Claude Chabrol, who offered Michel Bouquet in 1969 to perform in The Unfaithful Wife a deceived husband who kills his wife’s lover, Stéphane Audran. Michel Bouquet definitely has tragic destinies with women. He embodies by his silhouette, his looks, his presence, his most icy character. Chabrol is delighted to have such an actor to personify the bourgeoisie of which he has made himself the portraitist.
“Toto the Hero”
The Belgian director Jaco van Dormael brings Michel Bouquet back to life in the cinema, somewhat forgotten, in 1990, in Toto the hero. He plays a senior who remembers his childhood life, obsessed with the conviction of not having been educated by his real parents. The film was to relaunch the actor’s presence in cinema until the end of his life, his last film being secret ceremony by Tatiana Becquet-Genel which will be released on June 22, 2022.
“Renoir”
Often identified with dark, even Machiavellian characters, Michel Bouquet is for Gilles Bourdos in 2012 Renoir, painter of light in his last months. The resemblance is spectacular and the inner life of the painter, when he can hardly move, is interpreted by Bouquet with a palette that goes from joy to anger and resignation.
“The Walker of the Champ-de-Mars”
Rare French political biopic, The Walker of the Champ-de-Mars by Gérard Guédiguian in 2015, sees Michel Bouquet embody François Mitterrand at the end of his life, like Renoir previously. An end of reign in disuse, where Bouquet transmits this coldness which he often personified. The “Sphinx” shines through in the portrait, and the actor receives the César for Best Actor for the role in 2006.