Leslie caron

Little Leslie Caron, 1.56 m tall, is remembered for her natural grace, her talent for dancing and that mischievous, sweet and cheerful face that has lasted her entire life, however many years she was. Her filmography is extensive, but her golden age was her beginning, during the 50s, when she shone with her own light, moving with unusual lightness and singing wonderfully. Later her appearances had less impact, although she went on to win a Golden Globe.

Leslie Claire Margaret Caron was born on July 1, 1931 in Boulogne-Billancourt, a French town located in the Hauts de Seine. Daughter of a French chemist, Claude Caron, and the American dancer Margaret Petit, Leslie knew very early what it was like to move her feet to the rhythm of the music, since from a very young age her mother insisted that she emulate the steps of she. When she was not yet twenty years old, the dancer Gene Kelly noticed her while watching her in a ballet. The crush was great since he immediately signed her to be her muse in An American in Paris , by Vincente Minnelli, for many one of the best musicals in the history of cinema. There is no doubt that Leslie Caron left her mark with her salty character as Lise Bouvier, the young Parisian woman who charms the Montmartre-based painter Jerry Mulligan. The wonderful final dance remains for history, with one of the most memorable choreographies ever performed.

In 1951, at the age of 20, he married Geordie Hormel , whom he would divorce in 1954. It was the beginning of many sentimental lurches in his private life. She with actor Peter Hall she had two children and they were married from 1956 to 1965, until her divorce. It seems that the cause of their separation was the affair that Caron had with Warren Beatty in 1961. And her last marriage was with the filmmaker Michael Laughlin , with whom she shared her life from 1969 to 1980 and who directed her in the discreet thriller Chandler .

After her impressive debut, Hollywood opened the doors wide for Leslie Caron, who began a long career at Metro Goldwyn Mayer. During the decade that was beginning, he starred in enduring titles, most of them musical, that would remain in the memory of the moviegoer. With Lili (1953) he earned his first Oscar nomination. This is a splendid musical drama, directed by Charles Walters and co-starring Mel Ferrer . The film was also nominated for five other statuettes, although it only won the award for best soundtrack. A more dramatic touch had Three loves(1953), where the actress starred in the segment “Mademoiselle”, one of the three into which the film is divided. Again with Walters he would repeat his success in The Glass Slippers (1955), although that same year the film he shot with the great Fred Astaire , Daddy Long Legs , under the orders of Jean Negulesco , where Caron was a little French orphan, was more delicious. the one who sponsored the ace of tap dance. Needless to say, she has to later both fall in love. Three years later she played another of her great roles in Gigi, wonderful musical by the genius Minnelli. The film won a whopping 9 Oscars and Leslie Caron was nominated for a Golden Globe. The actress ended the decade with a prestigious film, although less commercial than usual. This is Austerlitz (1960), by the great pioneer Abel Gance , where Caron gave life to Mademoiselle de Vaudey.

The sixties began for Leslie Caron with another title role: Fanny , directed by Joshua Logan , another heavyweight. The actress, who was only thirty years old at the time, plays a naive young woman who, pregnant, is forced to marry a man much older than her. Caron was again nominated for a Golden Globe. In 1962 she played a very different role, that of a woman who is also pregnant, but who hopes to abort. The film, scandalous for the time, was The L-Shaped Room , and it earned the actress an Oscar nomination and, this time, a Golden Globe. In 1964 she decided directly on the other extreme, a crazy comedy with the mythical Cary Grant in the funnyOperation Whiskey , by Ralph Nelson . She followed that path in The Favor , where she played Doris Day with a likeable Rock Hudson . And a year later she gave a 180 degree turn again in the war, Is Paris Burning? , René Clément ‘s brilliant filmabout the Nazi occupation of the French capital, a film that still retains impressive strength.

Starting in the 70s, Leslie Caron’s career began to decline in terms of major films. She appeared in some television series, such as Falcon Crest or Holidays at Sea , and only stood out in a handful of films, such as the drama The Lover of Love (1977), by François Truffaut ; her as Alla Nazimova in the controversial biopic Valentino , from the same year; in the dramatic thriller La diagonal del loco (1984); in and just right comedies The Comedians (1995) and The Last Blonde Bombshells (2000). Her last appearances of any renown were in the romantic Chocolat andI divorced him .