Postcard Friendship Friday - Annie Girardot

Sensual and talented actress Annie Girardot (1931) appeared in more than 150 French and Italian film and television productions. She had her breakthrough in 1960 as the tragic prostitute Nadia in Visconti’s classic Rocco e i suoi fratelli, and during the 1970’s she was one of the most popular stars of the French cinema.


French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin.

Need to Take Risks and Experiment
Annie Suzanne Girardot was born in 1931, in Paris, France. In 1954 she graduated with honours from the Conservatoire de la rue Blanche (the Paris conservatory). That year she made her professional debut with the distinguished Comedie-Francaise. Her performance in Jean Cocteau’s La Machine à écrire in 1956, opposite Robert Hirsch, was admired by the author who called her “The finest dramatic temperament of the postwar period”. She remained with the Comedie-Francaise troupe through 1957, occasionally taking time off to perform in films, on radio, television and in Parisian cabarets and revues. Her inability to contain her need to take risks and experiment within the rigid dictates of the Comédie propelled Girardot toward the cinema. She had made an inauspicious film debut in the comedy Treize à table/Thirteen at the Table (1955, André Hunebelle). The following year she won the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti for her role as a blackmailing vamp opposite Pierre Fresnay in L'homme aux clés d'or/The Man With the Golden Keys (1956, Léo Joannon). In her early film roles, Girardot was typically cast as a doomed woman of dubious morals in dark films like Le rouge est mis/The red Light is On (1957, Gilles Grangier) and Maigret tend un piège/Maigret Lays a Trap (1957, Jean Delannoy), both starring Jean Gabin.


Trailer for Maigret tend un piège (1957).

Rocco and His Brothers
On stage Annie Girardot worked with famous director Luchino Visconti in Deux sur la balançoire/Two for the Seesaw (1958), at the side of Jean Marais. In the cinema she finally had her breakthrough when she played Nadia the prostitute in Visconti's epic family drama Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (1960, Luchino Visconti). Nadia's beauty drives a wedge between Rocco (Alain Delon) and his brother Simone (Renato Salvatori), who eventually rapes her and stabs her thirteen times. Her depiction of the reformed prostitute suffering in her humiliation was both poignant and compelling. During filming Girardot and Salvatori became romantically linked and they married in 1962. The couple later separated, but never divorced. In 1988 Salvatori died. Their daughter is Giulia Salvatori (1962).


Scene from a tv registration of Deux sur la balançoire (1958).

Cinema de Papa
Through the early 1960’s, Annie Girardot never worked with the young directors of the Nouvelle Vague, by whom she was seen as the actress of the Cinema de Papa. And indeed she worked regularly with older directors like Christian-Jaque (La Française et l'Amour/Love and the Frenchwoman, 1960; Guerre secrète/The Dirty Game, 1965) and Marcel Carné (Trois chambres à Manhattan/Three Rooms in Manhattan, 1965). For her role in the latter film as the neurotic Kay discovering love, she won the Best Actress award at the Venice Film Festival. She also played leads in Italian pictures directed by Marco Ferreri (La donna scimmia/The Ape Woman, 1963; Il seme dell'uomo/The Seed of Man, 1969, Dillinger è morto/Dillinger Is Dead, 1969), Mario Monicelli (I compagni/The Organizer, 1963), Duccio Tessari (Una voglia da morire, 1964) and Luchino Visconti (the anthology Le streghe/The Witches, 1966).


Scene from La donna scimmia/The Ape Woman (1963).

Box Office Magnet
Annie Girardot became a box office magnet in France with Vivre pour vivre/Live for Life (1967, Claude Lelouch). She gave a reserved, dignified performance as the deceived but forgiving wife of Yves Montand. Another big hit was the sentimental melodrama Un homme qui me plaît/A Man I Like (1969, Claude Lelouch) in which she was the vivacious Françoise destined to finish unhappily with Jean-Paul Belmondo. In the 1970’s Annie Girardot was one of the most popular film actresses of the French cinema, associated with the directors Lelouch, Philippe de Broca, and André Cayatte, and with actor Philippe Noiret. Her biggest international hit was the fact-based tale Mourir d'aimer/Death of Love (1971, André Cayatte) about the Gabrielle Russier affair. Very convincly she played the middle-aged literature teacher who was accused of corrupting a minor, one of her students with whom she had an affair, and who, out of despair, committed suicide in jail. In the late 1960’s the affair had become a much debated subject, even president Georges Pompidou referred to it. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe. Each new film of ‘La Girardot’ was eagerly awaited for. Girardot typically played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often lonely women, giving her characters an earthiness and reality that endeared her with women undergoing similar daily struggles. Girardot became thus one of the symbols of the early-'70s feminist movement in France - though in personal life Girardot was not terribly involved with feminists.


French trailer for Les Novices (1970) with Annie Girardot and Brigitte Bardot.

Adept Comedienne
Annie Girardot started to play mother roles of young stars like Claude Jade in Les feux de la Chandeleur/Hearth Fires (1972, Serge Korber) or Isabelle Adjani in La gifle/The Slap (1974, Claude Pinoteau). She played Isabelle Huppert's mother in two films: Docteur Françoise Gailland/No Time for Breakfast (1975, Jean-Louis Bertucelli) and La pianiste/The Piano Teacher (2001, Michael Haneke). For portraying the title character in Docteur Françoise Gailland she won the César, the French Oscar, for Best Actress in 1977. Though she gave solid performances in many dramas, Girardot proved herself also an adept comedienne in such films as La vielle fille/The Old Maid (1972, Jean-Pierre Blanc), Tendre Poulet/Dear Inspector (1977, Philippe de Broca), La zizanie/The Spat (1978, Claude Zidi) and L'ingorgo - Una storia impossibile/Traffic Jam (1979, Luigi Comencini). Her success as the female detective Lise Tanquerelle, comically caught between personal and professional roles, in Tendre Poulet led to the sequel On a volé la cuisse de Jupiter/Jupiter's Thigh (1980, Philippe de Broca). She also helped young film directors making their first films. On stage she had a triumph in 1974 with Madame Marguerite, her signature role, which she reprised many times till 2002. That year she was awarded the Molière award for her role.


French language scene from Docteur Françoise Gailland (1976) with Annie Girardoy and Pascal Gregory.

Nightmarish Mother
By the 1980’s, her film career was in sharp decline and her film appearances became sporadic. She published her autobiography Vivre d'aimer in 1989, followed by Ma vie contre la tienne in 1993. However, in 1995 she made a come-back playing a peasant wife in Les Misérables (1995, Claude Lelouch). The role won her a Cesar for Best Supporting Actress. Upon accepting the award, a joyous and tearful Girardot expressed her happiness that she had not been forgotten. She also offered her heartfelt thanks to her many film industry colleagues. In 2002, she was again awarded this prize for her role as the nightmarish mother in La pianiste/The Piano Player (2002, Michael Haneke). She collaborated with Austrian director Haneke again, in Caché/Hidden (2005, Michael Haneke) starring Juliette Binoche. In 2006 Annie Girardot revealed in magazine Paris Match that she was suffering since 2003 from Alzheimer's disease. The following year Giulia Salvatori published, with journalist Jean-Michel Caradec'h, the biography La Mémoire de ma mère about her mother. Annie Girardot appeared for the last time in the tv documentary Annie Girardot, ainsi va la vie/Annie Girardot, as life goes (2008). Since 2008, she lives in a sanatorium in Paris.


Scene from Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (1960) with Annie Girardot, Alain Delon and Renato Salvatori.

Sources: Sandra Brennan (All Movie Guide), R. F. Cousins and Kelly Otter (Filmreference.com), Sol (IMDb), Ephraim Katz (The Film Encylopedia), Wikipedia, and IMDb