Jean Rochefort

Jean Raoul Robert Rochefort (French: [ʒã ʁɔʃfɔʁ]; 29 April 1930 – 9 October 2017) was a French actor. He received many accolades during his career, including an Honorary César in 1999.

Life and career

Rochefort was born on 29 April 1930 in Paris, France. Jean Rochefort was not born in Dinan, but his parents were living there. He was educated at the Lycée Pierre Corneille in Rouen.

Rochefort was nineteen years old when he entered the Centre d'Art Dramatique de la rue Blanche. Later he joined the Conservatoire National. After completing his national service in 1953, he worked with the Compagnie Grenier Hussenot as a theatre actor for seven years. There he was noted for his ability to play both drama and comedy. He then became a television and cinema actor, and also worked as director.

After some supporting roles in Cartouche, Captain Fracasse and in Marvelous Angelique, Rochefort played his first big role with Annie Girardot as his wife and Claude Jade as his daughter in Hearth Fires in 1972. In this drama, he starred as a man who leaves his family for ten years before returning. In this film he played at 41 years old a father of adult children (the young Claude Jade was already 23). To appear older, he grew a moustache, his trademark, which he later removed only once, in 1996 for Ridicule.