(ANSA) - ROME, DECEMBER 31 - French actor and director Robert Hossein, known for the role of the Count of Peyrac in the film series 'Angelica', died at the age of 93.
This was announced by his wife, actress Candice Patou, to FrancePresse, explaining that Hossein died "this morning in hospital after a respiratory crisis".
Born on December 30, 1927 to an Iranian composer and a Russian Orthodox, the actor, born Abraham Hosseinoff, grew up in poverty and decided after the war, at the age of 15, to devote himself to dramatic art.
Performing in musicals such as 'The miserable', 'A man named Jesus' and 'Notre Dame de Paris', Hossein became a sex symbol in the 1960s thanks to the role of Jeoffrey de Peyrac in the film 'Angelica, the March of Angels', which gave great notoriety.
In Reims he founded his "popular theater" and a school that launched Anémone and Isabelle Adjani.
In his long career in cinema, from 1948 to 2019, he starred for Roger Vadim alongside Brigitte Bardot in the films 'The rest of the warrior' (1962), 'Ilvizio e la Virtue' (1963), Barbarella (1968).
In 1969 he took part in Luigi Magni's film 'In the year of the Lord'.
"He was an actor, author, director, the prince of popular theater, his successes are countless, he had a charming smile, a velvet gaze, a beautiful voice: so many qualities for a man who had the charm of Robert Hossein", he commented on Twitter the historic president of the Cannes Festival, Gilles Jacob.
(HANDLE).