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Michele Morgan - in her heyday

The French actress Michèle Morgan, who was the unforgettable partner of Jean Gabin in Le Quai Des Brumes, died today in Paris at the age of 96.

Born Simone Renée Roussel on 29 February 1920, Michèle Morgan began her career in 1935 as an extra in La Vie Parisienne directed by Robert Siodmak, and in Mademoiselle Mozart by Yvan Noé, in which the title role was taken by Danielle Darrieux.

She decided to take her craft seriously, enlisting in the stage school Cours Simon where she learned the essentials of acting - and paid for her studies by continuing to take small roles in films.

Then in 1937 she made her mark in Gribouille by Marc Allégret and ascended to mythic status when (in Le Quai Des Brumes) Jean Gabin remarked “Tu as des beaux yeux, tu sais …” (“You know you have beautiful eyes …”) to which she replied: “Embrasse-moi.

Marc Allégret: From André Gide lover to Simone Simon mentor (photo: Marc Allégret) (See previous post: "Simone Simon Remembered: Sex Kitten and Femme Fatale.") Simone Simon became a film star following the international critical and financial success of the 1934 romantic drama Lac aux Dames, directed by her self-appointed mentor – and alleged lover – Marc Allégret.[1] The son of an evangelical missionary, Marc Allégret (born on December 22, 1900, in Basel, Switzerland) was to have become a lawyer. At age 16, his life took a different path as a result of his romantic involvement – and elopement to London – with his mentor and later "adoptive uncle" André Gide (1947 Nobel Prize winner in Literature), more than 30 years his senior and married to Madeleine Rondeaux for more than two decades. In various forms – including a threesome with painter Théo Van Rysselberghe's daughter Elisabeth – the Allégret-Gide relationship remained steady until the late '20s and their trip to...

Oscar winners Olivia de Havilland and Luise Rainer among movie stars of the 1930s still alive With the passing of Deanna Durbin this past April, only a handful of movie stars of the 1930s remain on Planet Earth. Below is a (I believe) full list of surviving Hollywood "movie stars of the 1930s," in addition to a handful of secondary players, chiefly those who achieved stardom in the ensuing decade. Note: There’s only one male performer on the list — and curiously, four of the five child actresses listed below were born in April. (Please scroll down to check out the list of Oscar winners at the 75th Academy Awards, held on March 23, 2003, as seen in the picture above. Click on the photo to enlarge it. © A.M.P.A.S.) Two-time Oscar winner and London resident Luise Rainer (The Great Ziegfeld, The Good Earth, The Great Waltz), 103 last January...