Elina Labourdette

Élina Labourdette, born Élina Janine Alice Henri-Labourdette on 21 May 1919 in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, was a French actress whose career spanned stage, screen, and television across several decades. The daughter of Jean Henri-Labourdette, a noted coachbuilder and automobile designer, she initially pursued dance, studying rhythmic movement with Irène Popard and classical technique with Alexandre Volinine before abandoning aspirations of becoming a prima ballerina due to health reasons. During her school years she began acting training under the actress Ève Francis, laying the foundation for a career that would take her from French cinema to the Broadway stage.

Labourdette made her film debut in 1938 at the age of nineteen in The Shanghai Drama, directed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst. Following that debut, she spent six months in England, where she studied theatre and singing in addition to learning English. René Clair cast her as the teacher heroine in his project Air pur, though the outbreak of the Second World War halted production. Her international reputation was established with Robert Bresson's Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne, filmed in 1944, in which she portrayed a cabaret dancer turned prostitute who is manipulated by a vengeful woman into ensnaring a former lover. Jacques Becker's Edward and Caroline in 1951 further cemented her standing as one of the notable French actresses of her generation.

In 1950, Labourdette joined the theatre company of Madeleine Renaud and Jean-Louis Barrault, balancing stage work alongside her film commitments. It was through this association that she appeared on Broadway in 1952, performing in five productions: La Répétition ou L'Amour Puni, Occupe-toi d'Amélie, Amphitryon 38, Le Procès, and Baptiste. Her screen career continued through the 1950s and 1960s, during which she worked under directors including René Clément, Jean-Paul Le Chanois, André Cayatte, and Gilles Grangier. In 1956 she appeared in Jean Renoir's Elena and Her Men alongside Ingrid Bergman and Jean Marais, and in 1961 she took a supporting role in Lola, the debut feature of Jacques Demy. Her final film credit was Le Clair de terre, a 1970 production directed by Guy Gilles.

Beyond her acting work, Labourdette lent her voice to Grace Kelly in the French-dubbed versions of John Ford's Mogambo in 1953 and Alfred Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief in 1955. From the late 1950s onward she appeared in French television productions, including the popular series Les Cousins de la Constance. In 1956 she married journalist and writer Louis Pauwels, and the couple adopted a daughter, Zoé, in 1961. Pauwels died in 1997. Labourdette died on 30 September 2014 in Le Mesnil-le-Roi, Yvelines, at the age of 95.