Michel Piccoli death: French actor who starred in Godard’s ‘Le Mépris’ dies aged 94

Actor worked with revered directors such as Jean-Luc Godard, Luis Buñuel, and Jacques Demy

(VALERY HACHE/AFP via Getty Images)

French actor Michel Piccoli, who starred in seminal films such as Jean-Luc Godard’s Le Mépris, has died at the age of 94.

His family confirmed the death to Agence France-Presse on Monday.

Piccoli died of a stroke on Monday surrounded by his wife Ludivine Clerc and two of his children, according to the family’s statement.

Throughout his seven-decade career, Piccoli made history both on the theatre stage and on the silver screen.

He worked with director Luis Buñuel from the 1950s through the 1970s, notably appearing in Belle de Jour, The Milky Way, and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie.

Piccoli’s career also included collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock (Topaz), Agnès Varda (Les Créatures), Jacques Demy (The Young Girls of Rochefort), Jean-Pierre Melville (Le Doulos) and many more.

Born in 1925 in Paris to musician parents, Piccoli scored his first roles in theatre and in cinema in the 1940s.

His break came in 1963, when he appeared next to Brigitte Bardot in Godard’s Le Mépris (Contempt).

In recent years, Piccoli played the titular pope in Nanni Moretti’s Habemus Papam (released in 2011), and appeared in Alain Resnais’s 2012 You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet.

Piccoli in 1980 won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor, for his performance in Marco Bellocchio’s A Leap in the Dark.

He was nominated for four Césars, including for his role in Jacques Rivette’s 1991 La Belle Noiseuse.

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Piccoli was married three times, first to actor Éléonore Hirt, with whom he had a daughter, then to singer Juliette Gréco.

He married Clerc in 1978 and ​the union lasted until his death. Together, the pair adopted two children.