Actor Jean-François Stévenin, who began his career with Rivette and Truffaut before becoming a popular supporting role in French cinema and then a cult director in just three films, died Tuesday at the age of 77, his family told the AFP.
"He died in the hospital in Neuilly, he fought well
,
"
said his son Sagamore Stévenin, also an actor.
Read also: Rediscovering Jean-François Stévenin
Director of three films considered to be cult (
Passe montagne
,
Doubles Messieurs
and
Mischka
), Jean-François Stévenin is a prolific actor seen in films as eclectic as
Pocket money
by François Truffaut,
Une chambre en ville
by Jacques Demy or Le pacte des loups by Christophe Gans.
Born in the Jura in 1944, this former student at HEC, with a romantic and treacherous background, discovered film sets during an internship in Cuba ... on dairy production.
“I didn't know how to do anything, but I learned to speak Spanish very quickly, and I melted into the team.
Incognito, ”
he said.
A familiar figure
In 1968, he became assistant to Alain Cavalier on the set of
La Chamade
.
“For ten years, I was an assistant, I never thought of playing. (...) And in
Out One,
by Jacques Rivette, where Juliet Berto had said: "
It's funny, the assistant looks like Brando, why wouldn't he play Marlon?"
“The scene was kept for editing,”
he recalled in 2000 for Liberation.
His round face and piercing blue eyes quickly made him a familiar figure in French cinema.
In the 1980s, he toured under the direction of Jean-Luc Godard (
Passion
), Bertrand Blier (Notre histoire) and Catherine Breillat (
36 Fillette
).
Then will come the most successful films such as
The Pacte des loups
, where he plays with Vincent Cassel and Samuel Le Bihan or the
Man of the train
directed by Patrice Leconte.
Jean-François Stévenin: "A film is never finished"
In 2018, his work as a filmmaker earned him a Jean-Vigo Honorary Award, which was awarded to him by Agnès Varda.
This award distinguishes independence of mind, quality and originality.
His films, where nature is very present, are marked by the cinema of Cassavetes and, like the American filmmaker, he likes to film those close to him.
He is the father of four children, all actors: Sagamore, Robinson, Salomé and Pierre.
His latest film,
Illusions perdues
by Xavier Giannoli, adapted from Balzac, is due to be screened at the Venice Film Festival in September.
