Philippe Noiret

Philippe Noiret was a French stage and film actor born on October 1, 1930, in Lille, France, the son of Lucy (Heirman) and Pierre Noiret, who worked as a representative for a clothing company. He died on November 23, 2006, in Paris, from cancer, at the age of 76.

Noiret struggled academically, attending several prestigious Paris institutions including the Lycée Janson de Sailly but failing his baccalauréat examinations on multiple occasions. This led him to pursue formal theatrical training at the Centre Dramatique de l'Ouest. He subsequently spent seven years touring with the Théâtre National Populaire, during which he met actress Monique Chaumette, whom he married in 1962. Alongside his stage work during this period, he performed as a nightclub comedian in a duo act with Jean-Pierre Darras, in which Noiret portrayed Louis XIV in an elaborate wig while Darras played the dramatist Jean Racine. The act satirized the politics of Charles de Gaulle, Michel Debré, and André Malraux.

In 1958, Noiret appeared on Broadway in four productions: Don Juan, Marie Tudor, Le Cid, and Lorenzaccio.

His screen debut came in 1949 in an uncredited role in Gigi. In 1955, director Agnès Varda cast him in La Pointe Courte, in which he played a lovelorn youth in the southern fishing port of Sète. He was not cast again until 1960, when he appeared in Zazie dans le Métro. Secondary roles followed in Georges Franju's Thérèse Desqueyroux in 1962 and in Le Capitaine Fracasse, before Jean-Paul Rappeneau's A Matter of Resistance in 1966 brought him more substantial recognition. He achieved star status in France with Yves Robert's Alexandre le Bienheureux.

Noiret frequently took on the role of the Everyman but did not avoid controversial material. In 1973, he appeared in La Grande Bouffe, a film depicting suicide by overeating that generated a scandal at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1987, he played an elderly doctor gradually suspected of covert homosexuality in The Gold Rimmed Glasses, based on Giorgio Bassani's novel and co-starring Rupert Everett. André Téchiné cast him in 1991's J'embrasse pas as a melancholy older man obsessed with young male flesh.

He also appeared in several Hollywood-financed productions, including Alfred Hitchcock's Topaz, George Cukor's Justine, Ted Kotcheff's Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?, Peter Yates's Murphy's War, and Anatole Litvak's The Night of the Generals. Among his most internationally recognized performances were the role of Alfredo in Cinema Paradiso in 1988, Pablo Neruda in Il Postino, and Major Dellaplane in Bertrand Tavernier's Life and Nothing But.

Noiret received two César Awards for Best Actor, the first in 1976 for Le Vieux Fusil and the second in 1990 for La Vie et rien d'autre. He also received a BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role in 1990 for Cinema Paradiso. By the time of his death, he had accumulated more than 100 film credits. Outside of acting, he was a passionate horseman, a pursuit he shared with actor friends Jean Rochefort and Jean-Pierre Marielle.