Annie Girardot Facts for Kids

Quick facts for kids Annie Girardot
Girardot in 2005
Born	Annie Suzanne Girardot (1931-10-25)25 October 1931 Paris, France
Died	28 February 2011(2011-02-28) (aged 79) Paris, France
Resting place	Père Lachaise Cemetery
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1954–2008
Spouse(s)	Renato Salvatori (m. 1962; died 1988)

Annie Suzanne Girardot (born October 25, 1931 – died February 28, 2011) was a famous French actress. She often played strong, independent, and hard-working women. Many people loved her characters because they felt real and relatable.

Annie Girardot had a long career spanning five decades, starring in almost 150 movies. She won many important awards, including three César Awards (which are like the French Oscars) in 1977, 1996, and 2002. She also won two Molière Awards for her theater work and a David di Donatello Award. In 1965, she won the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival for her role in Three Rooms in Manhattan.

Early Career and Rise to Fame
Becoming a French Movie Star in the 1970s
Later Career and Comeback
Personal Life and Legacy
- Remembering Annie Girardot
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Early Career and Rise to Fame

After finishing her studies at the famous Conservatoire de la rue Blanche in 1954, Annie Girardot joined the Comédie Française. This is a very well-known French theater group. She was a regular actress there from 1954 to 1957.

Her first movie was Thirteen at the Table in 1955. However, it was her theater work that first caught the attention of critics. A famous writer named Jean Cocteau greatly admired her acting in his play La Machine à écrire in 1956. He called her "The finest dramatic temperament of the Postwar period." In 1958, she worked with the famous director Luchino Visconti in a play called Two for the Seesaw.

Girardot with Renato Salvatori in Luchino Visconti's Rocco and His Brothers (1960)

In 1956, she received the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti as a promising young actress. But it was her role in Luchino Visconti's big movie Rocco and His Brothers (1960) that made her truly famous. In 1962, she married Italian actor Renato Salvatori. She worked in both France and Italy, starring in many films. One notable movie was The Ape Woman (1964), directed by Marco Ferreri, which was a big hit at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival. In 1968, she also appeared in the popular French film Erotissimo.

Even though some newer French directors didn't often cast her, Annie Girardot became very popular in mainstream cinema. She worked with well-known directors like Jean Delannoy and Marcel Carné.

Becoming a French Movie Star in the 1970s

By the late 1960s, Annie Girardot was a huge movie star in France. People flocked to see her films. Some of her successful movies from this time include Live for Life (1967) and Love Is a Funny Thing (1969).

One of her biggest hits was Mourir d'aimer (To Die of Love, 1971). This film was based on a true story about a teacher whose relationship with a much younger student caused a scandal. The movie was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and was her most successful film in France.

Girardot in 1970

Throughout the 1970s, Annie Girardot showed her talent in both serious dramas and funny comedies. She was great at comedy in films like Claude Zidi's La Zizanie and Philippe de Broca's Dear Inspector (1977). She also played Isabelle Adjani's mother in the teen movie The Slap (1974).

In 1972, she told The New York Times that she loved playing different kinds of characters, from a duchess to a kitchen worker. She won her first César Award for Best Actress for her role in the drama Docteur Françoise Gailland (1976). During the 1970s, she was the highest-paid actress in France. People even called her "La Girardot" because her name alone was enough to make a movie a success. Many of her films attracted over a million viewers in France.

Annie Girardot became a symbol for the women's rights movement in France during the 1970s. Audiences loved how she brought a "real woman" quality to the strong female characters she played. In her autobiography, she wrote that people came to see a woman they could relate to, not just a glamorous star. She played many different roles, like a judge, a lawyer, a taxi driver, a police officer, and a surgeon.

Later Career and Comeback

The 1980s were a bit harder for Annie Girardot's career, and she didn't get as many roles. In 1983, she lost a lot of money when a musical show she produced and starred in didn't do well. She felt sad for a while but then found success again in several TV series in France and Italy.

Girardot at Cannes festival in 2000

However, Annie Girardot made a big comeback in movies when she played a peasant wife in Claude Lelouch's Les Misérables (1995). For this role, she won her second César Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1996. When she accepted the award, she was very happy and emotional, saying how glad she was that the film industry hadn't forgotten her. This speech became very famous.

She won another César Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in The Piano Teacher (2001). She also worked again with director Michael Haneke in the film Caché (2005).

On stage, she had a huge success in 1974 with Madame Marguerite. This became her most famous stage role, and she performed it many times until 2002. That year, she won a Molière Award for this role and an honorary Molière Award for her entire career in theater.

Annie Girardot is the top-ranked woman among French stars who have appeared in the most movies that attracted over a million viewers in France since 1945. She has 44 such films!

Personal Life and Legacy

Annie Girardot married Italian actor Renato Salvatori in 1962. They had a daughter named Giulia. They later separated but never officially divorced. Renato Salvatori passed away in 1988.

In 2006, Annie Girardot publicly shared that she was suffering from Alzheimer's disease. She became a symbol for the illness in France. She passed away on February 28, 2011, in a hospital in Paris, at the age of 79. She was buried in the Père-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Remembering Annie Girardot

Many streets in France are named after her, including some in Paris and Toulouse.
In October 2012, France's postal service released a collection of stamps honoring famous French actors, and Annie Girardot was one of them.
In 2013, a picture of Annie Girardot from the 1962 film Rocco and His Brothers was chosen as the official poster for the 37th annual César Awards 2012. During the ceremony, a special video showed highlights from her most memorable movie roles.