Comedian Michel Robin died on November 18, 2020, at the age of 90, from the consequences of Covid-19, has just announced the Comédie-Française of which he was a member.
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His partner on the stage and his friend from the French troupe, Eric Ruff, who currently directs it, immediately wanted to publish a moving tribute to his memory and his talent:
“These times are testing us sorely and we will hate it for suddenly depriving ourselves of the most fragile and the best among us.
We all have precise memories of Michel, who left our theater ten years ago.
Of his tenderness and his devastating humor.
Of his tooth too, carnivorous and funny.
We counted a lot for Michel who kept an unwavering attachment to our House .... Michel always played the old, very early in his career.
He recently conceded that he was finally old enough to play the part and that it annoyed him.
We are losing a grandfather, a theater father, a friend, a great actor.
All our thoughts and our sadness are with Amélie, her daughter, and Gaspard, her grandson, whom Michel adored. ”
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Young, he played the old wonderfully
Michel Robin begins at the theater with Roger Planchon.
From 1958 to 1964 he played in seventeen shows including
Les Trois Mousquetaires
,
George Dandin
,
Les Âmes mortes
... He then joined the Renaud-Barrault Company for several seasons and performed one of his outstanding pieces,
Waiting for Godot
by Samuel Beckett. scene by Roger Blin (1970), then by the same author plays in
Fin de partie
under the direction of Guy Rétoré at the Théâtre de l'Est in Paris.
From his theatrical career outside the Comédie-Française, we can cite shows such as
Les Oiseaux
d'Aristophane at the Théâtre Renaud-Barrault,
Le Balcon
by Jean Genet at the Odéon,
La Nuit des rois
by Shakespeare at the Théâtre de Chaillot,
La Folle de Chaillot
by Jean Giraudoux in Nantes.
In 1990, he was awarded the Molière for best supporting role for
La Traversée de hiver
by Yasmina Reza, directed by Patrice Kerbrat.
From Chabrol to Costa-Gavras
Also an actor in the cinema, he goes from Goretta to Zulawski, from Doillon to Lang or Costa-Gavras.
In 1979, he won the Grand Prix for interpretation by the jury of the Locarno Festival for
Les Petites Fugues
by Yves Yersin.
We have also seen it in
Merci pour le chocolat
directed by Chabrol,
Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain
and
Un long dimanche de fiançailles
by Jean-Pierre Jeunet.
He made numerous appearances on television: human hero of the French version of
Fraggle Rock
in the 1980s and recurring character in the
Boulevard du Palais series
.
In 1994, Jean-Pierre Miquel, then general administrator, opened the doors of the Comédie-Française to him and hired him as a boarder to play the role of Trivelin in
La Double Inconstance
de Marivaux.
He then played, among other roles, Monsieur Rémy from the
Fausses Confidences
staged by Jean-Pierre Miquel,
Firs from La Cerisaie
staged by Alain Françon, Louka Loukitch Khlopov in
Le Revizor
staged by Jean-Louis Benoit.
A formidable Monsieur Jourdain
Often distributed in supporting roles, in 1996 he tackled his first major role in French under the guise of Monsieur Jourdain in
Le Bourgeois gentilhomme
by Molière directed by Jean-Louis Benoit.
Michel Robin was appointed 495th member on January 1, 1996.
During the 2000s, he played under the direction of Brigitte Jaques-Wajeman, Alain Françon, Piotr Fomenko, Christian Schiaretti, André Wilms, Lukas Hemleb, Denis Podalydès…, interpreting roles as varied as the Gna in
Le Gna
by Pierre-Henri Loÿs, Don Guritan in
Ruy Blas
, Gérôme in
Le Dindon
by Feydeau, Karp in
La Forêt d'Ostrovski
, Tiresias in
Les Bacchantes by Euripides
, the Poète in
Ophélie and other animals
by Jacques Roubaud, Basque in
Le Misanthrope
by Molière, or even those by Bourgeois, Poète, Capucin and Cadet in
Cyrano de Bergerac
by Edmond Rostand.
He also plays Barry Derrill alongside Michel Duchaussoy in
The End of the Beginning
by Sean O'Casey directed by Célie Pauthe, the Old Man in
Les Chaises
d'Ionesco directed by Jean Dautremay - under whose direction he also plays in
Five dramaticules
by Samuel Beckett–, Brid'oison in
Le Mariage de Figaro
by Beaumarchais by Christophe Rauck, Feraponte in
Les Trois Sœurs
by Tchekhov directed by Alain Françon. He left the Comédie-Française at the end of 2010.
He then continued to pursue his rich career both in the theater (notably under the direction of Alain Françon, Christophe Rauck, Denis Podalydès) and in the cinema (
Adieu Berthe
by Bruno Podalydès,
Vous n ' haven't seen anything yet
by Alain Resnais, L
'Odeur de la mandarine
by Gilles Legrand…) and on television in series (
Louis la Brocante
) and telefilms (
La Forêt
d'Arnaud Desplechin for the “ARTE-Comédie-Française” collection "
I present my wife
Elisabeth Rappeneau,
Bloody Collioure
Bruno Garcia).
Michel Robin was a knight in the National Order of Merit and an officer in the Order of Arts and Letters.
