Catherine Fabienne Dorléac (born 22 October 1943), known professionally as Catherine Deneuve (, , ), is a French actress. She is considered one of the greatest European actresses on film. In 2020, The New York Times ranked her as one of the greatest actors of the 21st century.
Deneuve made her screen debut in 1957 at age 13, in a film shot the previous year when she was only 12. A major figure of the New Wave, she became, like Brigitte Bardot and Alain Delon, one of the best-known French artists in the world. In a career spanning nearly 70 years, she has played more than a hundred roles and is recognized in France and internationally for being one of the key faces of the musical film genre with appearances in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, The Young Girls of Rochefort, Donkey Skin, 8 Women and The Beloved. Early in her career, she gained acclaim for her portrayals of aloof and mysterious beauties while working for well-known directors such as Luis Buñuel, François Truffaut, Jacques Demy, Roman Polanski, and Agnès Varda.Catherine Deneuve Biography . Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Her career led her to work in several countries: in the United States, under the direction of Robert Aldrich and Tony Scott; in the United Kingdom, collaborating with Terence Young and Dick Richards; in Italy, with Marco Ferreri, Mauro Bolognini, Sergio Citti, Mario Monicelli and Dino Risi; in Spain, with Luis Buñuel; in Portugal, with Manoel de Oliveira; in Denmark, with Lars von Trier; in Japan, with Eric Khoo; and also in Austria, Russia and Lebanon. She played in films attracting a total of nearly 99 million spectators in theaters, making her the working actress with the most admissions in France. In 1985, she succeeded Mireille Mathieu as the official face of Marianne, France's national symbol of liberty.
She has received numerous accolades over her career including a César Award for The Last Metro and the Venice Film Festival's Volpi Cup for Best Actress for Place Vendôme, as well as nominations for an Academy Award for Indochine and a BAFTA Award for Belle de Jour. To English-speaking audiences, Deneuve is best known for The Hunger. Her other notable films include Repulsion, The April Fools, Scene of the Crime and My Favorite Season. She has received honorary awards, including the Berlin International Film Festival's Honorary Golden Bear in 1998, the Cannes Film Festival's Honorary Palme d'Or in 2005, and the Venice Film Festival's Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2022.
Early life
Deneuve was born Catherine Fabienne Dorléac in Paris, the daughter of French stage actors Maurice Dorléac and Italian-FrenchLa Stampa, 28 agosto 2002, pag. 26 archiviolastampa.it Renée Simonot. Deneuve had two sisters, Françoise Dorléac (21 March 1942 – 26 June 1967) and Sylvie Dorléac (born 14 December 1946),Catherine Deneuve at Yahoo! Movies as well as a maternal half-sister, Danièle, whom their mother had out of wedlock in 1936 with Aimé Clariond. Deneuve used her mother's maiden name, which she chose for her stage name, in order to differentiate herself from her sisters. Deneuve attended Catholic schools."The Los Angeles Times Interview from 1992" Tout Sur Deneuve
Film career 1957–1970: Breakthrough and acclaim
Deneuve made her film debut with a small role in André Hunebelle's Les Collégiennes (1957) with her younger sister Sylvie Dorléac who, like their older half-sister Daniele, was an occasional child actress. She subsequently appeared in several films for director Roger Vadim as well as in (1960), which caught the eye of Jacques Demy, who cast Deneuve as Geneviève Emery in his romantic film musical The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), the film that brought her to stardom. The film received critical acclaim winning the Palme d'Or at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival. Variety praised her performance, writing, "Catherine Deneuve, a winsome-looking type that other directors have forced to act, here is allowed to be herself. She etches a fine portrait of a 16-year-old in love." The same year she acted in several films including the anthology film The World's Most Beautiful Swindlers in a segment directed by Claude Chabrol and the comedy Male Hunt directed by Édouard Molinaro.
In her English-language debut, Deneuve played the cold but erotic persona, for which she would be nicknamed the "ice maiden", in Roman Polanski's psychological horror thriller Repulsion (1965). For her performance she was nominated for the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian wrote, "Catherine Deneuve's glassy stare of anxiety dominates the movie" comparing her to Janet Leigh in Psycho (1960). In 1966 she starred in the Agnès Varda fantasy film Les Créatures and Jean-Paul Rappeneau's A Matter of Resistance. The following year, she reunited with Demy for another musical The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967) acting alongside George Chakiris and Gene Kelly. She played a twin to her real-life older sister, Françoise Dorléac (as Solange), in what would be their only film together; Dorléac died in a car accident a few months after the movie opened. That same year she starred in Luis Buñuel's psychological erotic drama Belle de Jour (1967). Deneuve stars as a young woman who spends her midweek afternoons as a high-class prostitute, while her husband is at work. For her performance, she received a nomination for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Melissa Anderson writing for Criterion declared, "Deneuve's performance in Belle de jour turned out to be one of her most iconic".
In 1969, Deneuve starred in Stuart Rosenberg's American romantic comedy film The April Fools, starring opposite Jack Lemmon. That same year she acted in François Truffaut's romantic crime drama Mississippi Mermaid acting alongside Jean-Paul Belmondo. The New York Times film critic Vincent Canby praised the film writing, "As in all of Truffaut's films, love leads only to an uncertain future that, at best, may contain some joy along with the inevitable misery. Truffaut's special talent, however, is for communicating a sense of the value of that joy." She reunited with Buñel for the drama Tristana (1970) acting alongside Fernando Rey and Franco Nero. Her work for Buñuel would be her best known. That same year, she reunited with Jacques Demy for the musical fantasy Donkey Skin (1970) based on the 1695 fairy tale of the same name by Charles Perrault. Roger Ebert praised the film writing, "It provides a visual feast and fanciful imaginations, and Deneuve was then, as she was before and since, a great beauty with the confidence such beauty requires."
1971–1989: Established actress
In 1971, Deneuve starred in Nadine Trintignant's It Only Happens to Others opposite Marcello Mastroianni. She also starred in Marco Ferreri's Italian drama Liza (1972), Jean-Pierre Melville's French crime film Un flic (1972), and Jacques Demy's French comedy A Slightly Pregnant Man (1973). She starred in Robert Aldrich's crime film Hustle (1975) with Burt Reynolds. Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune awarded a full four stars out of four and wrote that "violence takes a back seat to character development and storytelling techniques that are classical. Hustle is the kind of picture you don't want to see end. It's going to be a cult favorite." That same year, she acted in Jean-Paul Rappeneau's adventure film Le Sauvage (1975) with Yves Montand. The following year, she acted in Claude Lelouch's Second Chance (1976).
In the 1980s, Deneuve's films included François Truffaut's Le Dernier métro (1980) with Gérard Depardieu for which she won the César Award for Best Actress and the David di Donatello Award for Best Actress. She gained acclaim for her role in Tony Scott's The Hunger (1983) as a bisexual vampire, co-starring with David Bowie and Susan Sarandon, a role which brought her a significant lesbian following, mostly among the gothic subculture. During this time, she received César Award for Best Actress nominations for her roles in André Téchiné's romantic drama Hotel America (1981), Jean-Pierre Mocky's French drama film Agent trouble (1987), and François Dupeyron's drama Drôle d'endroit pour une rencontre (1988). The later of which she also served as a producer, and starred alongside frequent co-star Gérard Depardieu.
1990–present
In the early 1990s, Deneuve's more significant roles included 1992's Indochine opposite Vincent Perez, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress and won a second César Award for Best Actress; and André Téchiné's two films, Ma saison préférée (1993) and Les Voleurs (1996). In 1997, Deneuve was the protagonist in the music video for the song N'Oubliez Jamais sung by Joe Cocker. In 1998, she won acclaim and the Volpi Cup at the Venice Film Festival for her performance in Place Vendôme. In the late 1990s, Deneuve continued to appear in a large number of films such as 1999's five films Est-Ouest, Le temps retrouvé, Pola X, Belle maman, and Night Wind.
Deneuve's part in Lars von Trier's musical drama Dancer in the Dark (2000), alongside Icelandic singer Björk was subject to considerable critical scrutiny. The film was selected for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. She made another foray into Hollywood the following year, starring in The Musketeer (2001) for Peter Hyams. In 2002, she shared the Silver Bear Award for Best Ensemble Cast at the Berlin International Film Festival for her performance in 8 Women. In 2005, Deneuve published her diary A l'ombre de moi-meme ("In My Own Shadow", published in English as Close Up and Personal: The Private Diaries of Catherine Deneuve); in it she writes about her experiences shooting the films Indochine and Dancer in the Dark. She also provided the voice role of Marjane Satrapi's mother in Satrapi's animated autobiographical film Persepolis (2007), based on the graphic novel of the same name.
Her 100th film appearance was in Un conte de Noël released in 2008. Deneuve's later work includes Potiche (2010) with frequent co-star Depardieu, Beloved (2011), alongside former co-stars Ludivine Sagnier and Chiara Mastroianni, the popular French adventure comedy Asterix and Obelix: God Save Britannia (2012) with Gérard Depardieu and Valérie Lemercier, screenwriter and director Emmanuelle Bercot's On My Way (2013), Palme d'Or winning writer/director Pierre Salvadori's comedy drama In the Courtyard (2014), and André Téchiné's drama In the Name of My Daughter (2014). She co-starred alongside Catherine Frot, in writer/director Martin Provost's French drama The Midwife (2017).
Career outside film
Modeling
Deneuve appeared nude in two Playboy pictorials in 1963 and 1965. Her image was used to represent Marianne, the national symbol of France, from 1985 to 1989. As the face of Chanel No. 5 in the late 1970s, she caused sales of the perfume to soar in the United Statesso much so that the American press, captivated by her charm, nominated her as the world's most elegant woman. In 1983, American Home Products retained her to represent their cosmetics line and hired world-renowned photographer Richard Avedon to promote its line of Youth Garde cosmetics, for which she famously proclaimed, "Look closely. Next year, I will be 40."
She is considered the muse of designer Yves Saint Laurent; he dressed her in the films Belle de Jour, La Chamade, La sirène du , Un flic, Liza, and The Hunger. In 1992, she became a model for his skincare line.