Michèle Girardon

Michèle Girardon
Born	August 9, 1938(1938-08-09) Lyon, France
Died	March 25, 1975(1975-03-25) (aged 36) Lyon, France
Years active	1956–1971

Michèle Girardon (August 9, 1938 – March 25, 1975), sometimes credited as Michele Girardon, was a French actress.

Born in Lyon, France, Girardon began acting as early as 1956, and had a small but noticeable role as a deaf-mute beauty in director Luis Buñuel's La mort en ce jardin (Death In The Garden) (1956). She soon became prominent in a host of films, including those of notable directors of the French New Wave. She is probably best known as an actress for her work in director Louis Malle's Les Amants (The Lovers) in 1958, and the 1961 Howard Hawks production of Hatari! starring John Wayne and Hardy Krüger. 1963 proved to be her most active year, with several avante garde films to her credit including Pierre Kast's Vacances Portugaises (Portuguese Vacations), André Cayatte's experimental 'paired' films Jean-Marc ou La vie conjugale (Anatomy of a Marriage: My Days with Jean-Marc), and Françoise ou La vie conjugale (Anatomy of a Marriage: My Days with Françoise), and director Éric Rohmer's La Boulangère de Monceau (The Girl at the Monceau Bakery).

During the 1960s, Girardon became romantically involved with a married Spaniard nobleman and notorious wastrel, José Luis de Vilallonga, whom she had first met on the set of Les Amants. By 1971, Girardon's acting career was essentially over, and after finally obtaining his divorce in 1972, de Villalonga ended their relationship in order to marry another woman. Girardon never married or had children and became increasingly despondent. She committed suicide via an overdose of sleeping pills at the age of 36 in Lyon on March 25, 1975, and is interred near Paris in the Cimetière de Bagneux, Hauts de Seine.

Selected filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1965	Die Pyramide des Sonnengottes	Josefa
	Der Schatz der Azteken
1964	The Magnificent Cuckold	Cristiana
	Devil of the Desert Against the Son of Hercules
	Jean-Marc ou La vie conjugale
	Françoise ou La vie conjugale
1963	The Bakery Girl of Monceau	Sylvie
1962	Hatari!	Brandy de la Court	(as Michele Girardon)
1961	White Slave Ship	Anna
1959	The Sign of Leo	Dominique Laurent
1958	The Lovers	The secretary
1956	Death in the Garden	María Castin

External links

Biography portal

• Michèle Girardon at the Internet Movie Database
• Michèle Girardon at Find a Grave

Persondata
Name	Girardon, Michèle
Alternative names	Girardon, Michele
Short description	French actress
Date of birth	August 9, 1938
Place of birth	Lyon, France
Date of death	March 25, 1975
Place of death	Lyon, France