Françoise Rosay
Known for: Acting
Françoise Rosay born Françoise Bandy de Nalèche, (19 April 1891 – 28 March 1974) was a French opera singer, diseuse, and actress who enjoyed a film career of over sixty years and who became a legendary figure in French cinema. She went on to appear in over 100 movies in her career. Rosay was born Françoise Bandy de Nalèche in Paris, the illegitimate daughter of Marie-Thérèse Chauvin, an actress known as Sylviac. She originally planned to become an opera singer, and in 1917, won a prize at the Paris Conservatoire and made her debut at the Palais Garnier in the title role of Salammbô by Ernest Reyer. She also sang in Castor et Pollux by Rameau and Thaïs by Massenet. Her first recorded film was Falstaff in 1911, and she began to work in Hollywood from 1929 onwards. In 1917, she married the director Jacques Feyder, with whom she remained until his death in 1948, having three sons. She appeared in several films under her husband's direction, including Le Grand Jeu (1933), Pension Mimosas (1934), La Kermesse héroïque (Carnival in Flanders) (1935) and Les Gens du voyage (1937). Rosay spent the duration of World War II in England and Switzerland, where she taught acting classes at the Conservatoire de Genève. She still appeared in films during this time, notably the British Halfway House (1944) as the refugee French wife of a British sea captain. During her career, she appeared with all the great stars of French cinema, including Jean Gabin, Michèle Morgan, Raimu, Jeanne Moreau, Danielle Darrieux, Micheline Presle, Paul Meurisse, Gérard Philipe, Louis Jouvet, Michel Simon, Simone Signoret, Fernandel and Jean-Louis Barrault. In Hollywood, she co-starred with Charles Boyer, Maurice Chevalier and Buster Keaton and worked with directors such as William Dieterle (September Affair, 1949), Martin Ritt (The Sound and the Fury, 1958), Ronald Neame (The Seventh Sin, 1956) and Peter Glenville (Me and the Colonel, 1957) with Danny Kaye. In England she appeared in The Alien Corn, a segment of the W. Somerset Maugham anthology film Quartet. A highly accomplished pianist herself in real life, she played the role of a famous piano virtuoso who gives aspiring pianist Dirk Bogarde a compassionate but honest and devastating critical appraisal of his likelihood of becoming a great musician – which results in his suicide. She performs in the film Schubert's Impromptu in E flat. In 1950 she appeared on stage at London's Winter Garden Theatre, playing the title role in 'Madame Tic Tac' but it had only a short run. It was not until 1938 that her biological father, Count François Louis Bandy de Nalèche, acknowledged her as his daughter. Her final appearance on film was in the Maximilian Schell-directed Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe-winner for Best Foreign-Language Foreign Film of 1974, Der Fußgänger (English title: The Pedestrian). She died in Montgeron, Île-de-France, near Paris. Her grave is located in Sorel-Moussel, Île-de-France, where she is buried with her husband, movie director Jacques Feyder. They had three sons. There are streets named after Françoise Rosay in Limoges, Montpellier, Chevry-Cossigny, Launaguet and Martigues. Source: Article "Françoise Rosay" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA.
Filmography
Series
Midi trente
Self
1972
Film
La Pouponnière
Mrs. Delannoy
1933
Series
Aujourd'hui Madame
Self - Guest
1970
Film
The Gambler
Aunt Antonia
1958
Film
The Counterfeiters of Paris
Madame Pauline
1961
Film
Ruy Blas
La duchesse d'Albuquerque
1965
Film
They Were Twelve Women
La duchesse de Vimeuse
1940
Film
Madame Récamier
Madame de Staël
1928
Film
Un merveilleux parfum d'oseille
Louise de Kerfuntel
1969
Film
The Red Inn
Marie Martin
1951
Film
Ramuntcho
Dolorès Detcharry
1938
Luck
Mme Mougeot
1931
Film
The Chess Player
Catherine II
1938
Film
3000 Million Without an Elevator
Madame Dubreuil
1972
Film
He Who Is Without Sin...
La contessa Lamieri
1952
Film
The 25th Hour
Mme Nagy (uncredited)
1967
Film
Vers l'abîme
Sylvia
1934
Film
Up from the Beach
Lili's Grandmother
1965
Film
The Stream
Régina Berry
1938
Film
Whirlpool
Madame Gardane
1935
Film
Bizarre, Bizarre
Margaret Molyneux
1937
Maternité
Mrs. Duchemin
1935
Film
Marchand d'amour
Clara
1935
Film
Queen Margot
Catherine de Médicis / Catharine of Medici
1954
Film
Cloportes
Gertrude, supplies specialist in the mafia
1965
Film
Gribiche
Edith Maranet
1926
Film
Not Dumb, the Bird
Mrs. Morelli-Johnson
1972
Film
The Secret of Polichinelle
Mrs. Jouvenel
1936
Film
Saraband for Dead Lovers
The Electress Sophia
1948
Film
The Seven Deadly Sins
Elisabeth de Pallières, the mother (segment "L'Orgueil")
1952
Film
Crainquebille
Shoe Store Customer
1922
Film
Back Streets of Paris
Mrs. Rose, hotel landlady
1946
Film
The Sound and the Fury
Caroline Compson
1959
Film
The Robber Symphony
The fortune teller
1937
Film
Le bateau de verre
Madame d'Arcy, his wife
1927
Film
The Woman Dressed As a Man
Princess Marie
1932
Film
Lovers Woods
Madame Parisot
1960
Film
Nobody's Children
La contessa Canali
1951
Film
Serge Panine
Madame Devarenne
1939
Film
Me and the Colonel
Madame Bouffier
1958
Film
Wanda the Sinner
Anna Steiner
1952
A Father Without Knowing It
Madame Jacquet
1932
Film
September Affair
Maria Salvatini
1950
Film
The Seventh Sin
Mother Superior
1957
Film
La Dame de Haut-le-Bois
Countess Brévannes
1947
Film
Don't Take God's Children for Wild Geese
Léontine Palpicart aka 'La Gâteuse'
1968
Let Us Be Gay
Madame Boucijon
1931
Film
Without Trumpet or Drum
La grand-mère de Marguerite
1959
Film
Two Timid Souls
The aunt
1928
Film
The Little Cafe
Mademoiselle Edwige
1931
Film
He
Madame Husson
1932
Film
Riff Raff Girls
Berthe
1959
Film
That Lady
Bernardine
1955
Film
Buster se marie
Polly Hathaway
1931
Film
Interlude
Comtesse Reinhart
1957
Film
Full Hearts and Empty Pockets
Borgia
1964
Film
Michel Audiard et le mystère du triangle des Bermudes
Self (archive footage)
2002
Film
Life Dances On
Marguerite Audié
1937
Film
The Halfway House
Alice Meadows
1944
Film
Quartet
Lea Makart (segment "The Alien Corn")
1948
Film
Carnival in Flanders
Madame Burgomaster
1935
Film
Eyes of Love
Mrs. Montcatel mother
1959
Film
Smuggler's Ball
Gabrielle Demeuse
1952
Film
Sul ponte dei sospiri
Lady of Sant'Agata
1953
Film
Girls of Today
padrona della pensione
1955
Film
Women Without Names
The Countess
1950
Film
Casanova Against His Will
Blanche Brissac
1931
Les éloquents
Self
1954
Film
Armchair 47
Gilberte Boulanger
1937
Film
Si l'empereur savait ça
Princess Plata d'Ettingen
1930
Film
Le Billet de mille
Russian Countess
1935
Film
The Full Treatment
Madame Prade
1960
Film
The Magnificent Lie
Rosa Duchêne
1931
Film
Portrait of a Woman
Fanny Helder
1944
Échec au roi
The Queen
1930
Film
L'Âge heureux
Mme Aubry
1966
Film
The Dream Vagabonds
Mireille Dombreval
1949
Film
Johnny Frenchman
Lanec Florrie
1945
Film
The One Woman Idea
Zuleide, Alizar's Mother
1929
Film
Pension Mimosas
Louise Noblet
1935
Film
All for Nothing
Mrs. Bossu
1933
Film
One Only Loves Once
Mme Monnier
1950
Film
The Trial of Mary Dugan
La veuve
1931
Film
Twentieth Century Theatre: Colombe
Madame Alexandra
1960
Film
Peace on the Rhine
Francoise Scheffer
1938
Film
The Last Four on Santa Cruz
Nadja Danouw
1936
Film
The Naked Heart
Laura Chapdelaine
1950
Film
Jenny
Jenny Gauthier
1936
Film
People Who Travel
Flora
1938
Film
K – Das Haus des Schweigens
Noemi, die Amme
1951
Film
Non sono più guaglione
Vincenzino's mother
1957
Film
The Great Game
Blanche
1934
Film
Stefanie in Rio
Leonora Guala
1960
Film
The Island
Silvia
1934
My Son the Minister
Sylvie - seine Mutter
1937
Film
Carnival in Flanders
Cornelia
1936
Film
Marius à Paris
1930
Film
The Pedestrian
Frau Dechamps
1973
Film
The 13th Letter
Mrs. Gauthier
1951
Film
Frau Cheneys Ende
Mrs. Webley
1962
Film
Marie des angoisses
Mme de Quersac
1935
Film
Jenny Lind
Rosatti
1931
Film
The Barton Mystery
Élisabeth
1949
Film
Fahrendes Volk
Madame Flora
1938
Film
Gangster malgré lui
1935
Film
Abbot Constantine
La comtesse de Laverdens
1933
Tambour battant
The Princess Mother
1934
Film
Coralie and Company
1934