Catherine Fabienne Dorléac, known professionally as Catherine Deneuve, is a French actress, producer, and model. 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. Early in her career, she gained acclaim for her portrayals of aloof and mysterious beauties for well-known directors, including Luis Buñuel, François Truffaut, Jacques Demy, Roman Polanski, and Agnès Varda. In 1985, she succeeded Mireille Mathieu as the official face of Marianne, France's national symbol of liberty.
Charles Boyer was a French-American actor who appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found his success in American films during the 1930s. His memorable performances were among the era's most highly praised, in romantic dramas such as The Garden of Allah (1936), Algiers (1938), and Love Affair (1939), as well as the mystery-thriller Gaslight (1944). He received four Oscar nominations for Best Actor. He also appeared as himself on the CBS sitcom I Love Lucy.
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is a 1964 musical romantic drama film written and directed by Jacques Demy, with music by Michel Legrand. Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo star as two young lovers in the French city of Cherbourg, separated by circumstance. The film's dialogue is entirely sung as recitative, including casual conversation, and is sung-through, or through-composed, like some operas and stage musicals. It has been seen as the second of an informal tetralogy of Demy films that share some of the same actors, characters, and overall atmosphere of romantic melancholy, coming after Lola (1961) and before The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967) and Model Shop (1969). The French-language film was a co-production between France and West Germany.
Jean-Alfred Villain-Marais, known professionally as Jean Marais, was a French actor, film director, theatre director, painter, sculptor, visual artist, writer and photographer. He performed in over 100 films and was the lover, muse and friend of acclaimed director Jean Cocteau. In 1996, he was awarded the French Legion of Honor for his contributions to French cinema.
Audrey Justine Tautou is a French actress. She made her acting debut at age 18 on television, and her feature film debut in Venus Beauty Institute (1999), for which she received critical acclaim and won the César Award for Most Promising Actress.
Porfirio Rubirosa Ariza was a Dominican diplomat, race car driver, soldier and polo player. He was a supporter of dictator Rafael Trujillo, and was rumored to be a political assassin under his regime. Rubirosa made his mark as an international playboy for his jetsetting lifestyle and his legendary sexual prowess with women. His five spouses included two of the richest women in the world.
Jacques Demy was a French director, screenwriter and lyricist. He appeared at the height of the French New Wave alongside contemporaries like Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut. Demy's films are celebrated for their visual style, which drew upon diverse sources such as classic Hollywood musicals, the plein-air realism of his French New Wave colleagues, fairy tales, jazz, Japanese manga, and the opera. His films contain overlapping continuity, lush musical scores and motifs like teenage love, labor rights, chance encounters, incest, and the intersection between dreams and reality. He was married to Agnès Varda, another prominent director of the French New Wave. Demy is best known for the two musicals he directed in the mid-1960s: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg [1964) and The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967).
Françoise Rosay was a French opera singer, diseuse, and actress who enjoyed a film career of over sixty years and who became a legendary figure in French cinema. She went on to appear in over 100 movies in her career.
The Young Girls of Rochefort is a 1967 French musical comedy film written and directed by Jacques Demy. The ensemble cast is headlined by real-life sisters Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac, and features George Chakiris, Michel Piccoli, Jacques Perrin, Grover Dale and Geneviève Thénier, along with Gene Kelly and Danielle Darrieux.
Micheline Presle was a French actress. She was sometimes billed as Micheline Prelle. Starting her career in 1937, she starred or appeared in over 150 films appearing first in productions in her native France and also in Hollywood during the era of Classical Hollywood Cinema, before returning again to Europe, especially French films from the mid-1960s until 2014.
Coco is a 1969 Broadway musical with a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by André Previn, inspired by the life of Coco Chanel. Katharine Hepburn starred in the title role, her first and only in a stage musical.
Model Shop is a 1969 romantic drama film written, directed and produced by Jacques Demy, starring Anouk Aimée, Gary Lockwood and Alexandra Hay, and featuring a guest appearance by Spirit who recorded the accompanying soundtrack. Demy made Model Shop, which was his first English-language film, following the international success of his film The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964). Aimée reprises the title role from Demy's 1961 French-language film Lola.
Gabrielle Bonheur "Coco" Chanel was a French fashion designer and businesswoman. The founder and namesake of the Chanel brand, she was credited in the post-World War I era with popularising a sporty, casual chic as the feminine standard of style. She is the only fashion designer listed on Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. A prolific fashion creator, Chanel extended her influence beyond couture clothing into jewellery, handbags, and fragrance. Her signature scent, Chanel No. 5, has become an iconic product, and Chanel herself designed her famed interlocked-CC monogram, which has been in use since the 1920s.
Love Songs is a 2007 French musical film directed by Christophe Honoré, starring Louis Garrel, Ludivine Sagnier, Clotilde Hesme and Chiara Mastroianni. It was one of the 20 films selected for the main competition at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.
Une chambre en ville is a 1982 French musical drama film written and directed by Jacques Demy, with music by Michel Colombier, and starring Dominique Sanda, Danielle Darrieux and Michel Piccoli. It is set against the backdrop of a workers' strike in 1955 Nantes. Like Demy's most famous film, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, it is an operetta-musical in which every line of dialogue is sung. However, unlike Cherbourg, Chambre is closer to tragedy, with a darker, more explicitly political tone.
Henri Decoin was a French film director and screenwriter, who directed more than 50 films between 1933 and 1964. He was also a swimmer who won the national title in 1911 and held the national record in the 500 m freestyle. He competed in the 400 m freestyle at the 1908 Summer Olympics and in the water polo tournament at the 1912 Summer Olympics.
Return at Dawn is a 1938 French drama film starring Danielle Darrieux, and was directed by Henri Decoin, who co-wrote the screenplay with Pierre Wolff, based on a short story by Vicki Baum. The music score is by Paul Misraki. The sets were designed by the art director Serge Piménoff. It was filmed in Zichyújfalu and Budapest, Hungary.
Rio is a 1939 American crime film directed by John Brahm and starring Basil Rathbone and Victor McLaglen. The film's title sequence doesn't credit a producer.
Marie Oppert is a French singer and actress, born in 1997.
The Hotel des Ambassadeurs is a former hotel in Vichy, now transformed into a private residence. During World War II, the hotel housed the diplomatic missions that moved from German-occupied Paris to Vichy.
