Celebrity Biographies
Jean Pierre Cassell
He was one of the most emblematic faces of French cinema, in the 60s and 70s. Jean-Pierre Cassel was the ideal actor to play elegant seducers. Illustrious filmmakers turned to him, such as Luis Buñuel, Abel Gance, Jean Renoir, Robert Altman, and Sidney Lumet, although he did his best roles under the orders of Claude Chabrol. Father of the actor Vincent Cassel, he was therefore the father-in-law of the very famous Monica Bellucci.
The actor died in Paris on April 19, 2007, as a result of a long illness, at the age of 74. He continued to be active until the last moment, as he leaves several films to be released, including Asterix and the Olympic Games .
Jean-Pierre Crochon was born in Paris on October 27, 1932. His father was a doctor, and his mother an opera singer who taught him to appreciate art. He learned to sing and dance and happened to meet ‘an American in Paris’, Gene Kelly himself, who was in the French capital filming Bound for Paris . Kelly suggested that they hire him, as an extra in the musical numbers. Shortly after, he rose to stardom, at least within France, after starring in Le Farceur , a comedy by Philippe de Broca , which again recruited him for The Games of Love . Typecast as a leading man, Jean Renoir gave him the lead role in Le caporal épinglé, one of his last films, and the Spanish Juan Antonio Bardem gave him a prominent presence in his rural drama Nothing happens . One of the most famous directors in his country, Abel Gance , cast him as d’Artagnan in his celebrated adventure film Cyrano et d’Artagnan . After obtaining one of his greatest successes as a lieutenant in Is Paris Burning? , the chronicle of the Nazi occupation filmed by René Clément , he was recruited by Luis Buñuel for The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie , by Richard Lester for The Three Musketeers and its sequels, and by Sidney Lumet , forMurder on the Orient Express . He also highlights the comedy The Doll and the Brute , one of Brigitte Bardot ‘s greatest hits .
Claude Chabrol offered him very different roles from the likeable gallants he had played up to then, in films such as The Seven Deadly Sins , The Breakup , The Follies of a Bourgeois Marriage , Hell , and The Ceremony . The actor never left the cinema, appearing in films such as Rivers in Purple , starring Vincent Cassel , one of his three children. He is not the only one who has followed in his father’s footsteps, as he is also dedicated to the cinema Cécile Cassel ( Women’s Games ).