Micheline Presle

Posted on by Tony CrawleyCategories:Actors

  1. Odette Joyeux, Leçon de conduit, France, 1945.      He was still new to the job, and then mainly directing French musicals (!) but Gilles Grangier hoped for better lovers – like Micheline Presle-François Périer. He got Odette-Gilbert Gil.
  2. Josette Day, La belle et la bête, France, 1945.       Poet, painter, scenarist, realisateur Jean Cocteau at his finest… Obviously, his lover, Jean Marais, would be La Bête, but who could match him, taunt him, enflame him as La Belle.Producteur André Paulvé suggested Presle.“Too fat,” said Cocteau and Marias as one.Then playwright and film-maker Marcel Pagnol recommended his most recent ex-mistress. Bingo!
  3. Joan Fontaine, Letter From An Unknown Woman, 1947.  Fontaine’s  favourite movie  and another beauty from German director  Max Ophüls (Opuls in the credits!).  But Micheline had signed with Universal… hating almost everything she was offered.
  4. Danielle Darrieux, Occupe-toi d’Amélie..!  France, 1949.  The first of four Presle roles that wound up being played by her friend, Danielle Darrieux.  A lush movie (based on a on a Feydeau play, whjch meanS it’s a farce – but with many barbs aimed as marriage, military and the general bourgeoisie. DD, who like Presle (and, indeed, Bardot) started acting on film not the stage, was the effervescent cocotte, surrounded by real and potential lovers.  Ah, the French.  
  5. Anne Vernon, Edouard et Caroline, France, 1950.     Daniel Gelin was the penniless pianist and Presle, Sophie Desmarets, Jeanne Moreau and Ludmilla Tcherina were seen for his wealthier wife. However, auteur Jacques Becker had not forgotten Edith Vignaudfrom his 1945 Falbalas.  She had since worked abroad. The UK’s Rank Organisation gave her a contract, four films, and a new name (“Edith is for  old biddies and who can pronounce Vignaud?).  Hollywood was not so smitten: one fllm and a shredded Universal deal..And so it was Anne Vernon who sparkled as Caroline. She and Gelin were The Couple of the hour – and witty again in Becker’s next, Rue de l’Estrapade, 1952.
  6. Ann Blyth, I’ll Never Forget You (aka The House in the Square), 1950.    Micheline Chassagne called herself Micheline Michel (“couldn’t’ find anything better”) for her first film, Je chant, 1938. (Her actual debut was in La fessée, 1937. “I have no memory of that”. Well, the title refers to smacking a bottom). She finally took the name of her lead role, Jacqueline Presle, in Jeunes filles en détresse (UK: Young Girls in Trouble),1939, by the great GW Pabst, himself.  And then, Hollywood phonetically called her Prelle…!!). She was due to work a second time with Tyrone Power as the 18th Century beauty falling for his transmigrating 20th Century atomic research physicist… Collective minds changed. Constance Smith was drafted and dropped  due to pneumonia, it says here.  More truthfully because  head Fox Fox Darryl F Zanuck felt she was not ready “for such a difficult part. ”  Enter: a Blyth spirit.
  7. Suzanne Cloutier, Juliette ou La clef des songes/Juliette or Key of Dreams, France, 1951.     Quickly shuttered by the Nazi Occupation when production began in October 1941,realisateur Marcel Carné revived his filma decade later with nota second, but a third pair of co-stars. From Jean Marais-Presle to Roland Lesarffe-Leslie Caron to Gérard Philipe-Cloutier… Presle was Philipe’s co-star in his 1946 breakthrough, Le diable au corps: and the Canadian Cloutier was Peter Ustinov’s second wife, 1945-1971.
  8. Corinne Calvet, What Price Glory, 1951     One French beauty for another as Calvet inherited Charmaine from Presle (or Prelle as LA inisted on calling her). No one sangthe Charmaine song – nor any others which annoyed top star James Cagney who believed he was booked for a musical. Director John Ford did not agree. And not for the first time…
  9. Danielle Darrieux, 5 Fingers, 1951.       First decent Hollywood role offered to the French star (after marrying US producer Bill Marshall) and guess – she was pregnant (with future French actress-director Tonie Marshall; 1951-2020).  Also suggested for master spy James Mason’s countess was David Selznick’s latest “new Garbo” from Italy . Alida Valli.
  10. Danielle Darrieux, Le rouge et le noir, Italy-France, 1953.     Micheline fell, like everyone else, for the Broadway Brando early in the 50s and persuaded réalisateur  Claude Autant-Lara (another fan) to fly him to Paris for talks about being Jean Sorel to her  Mathilde de la Mole in the Stendahl classic.  Brando  loved  the trip (he met one of the loves of his life, Christian Marquand), but Presle was soon installed in Hollywood with her second husband, US producer William Marshall. The delayed project later starred who else but Danielle Darrieux (but as Madame de la Renal) opposite Gerard Philippe, who had been made a star by Presle and Autant-Lara in Diable au corps (US: Devil in the Flesh), 1947.

  11. Antonella Lualdi, Le rouge et le noir, France-Italy,1954.  Micheline fell, like everyone else, for the Broadway Brando early in the 50s and persuaded réalisateur  Claude Autant-Lara (another fan) to fly him to Paris for talks about being Jean Sorel to her  Mathilde de la Mole in the Stendahl classic.  Brando  loved  the trip (he met one of the loves of his life, Christian Marquand), but Presle was soon installed in Hollywood with her second husband, US producer William Marshall. The delayed project later starred who else but Danielle Darrieux (but as Madame de la Renal) opposite Gerard Philippe, who had been made a star by Presle and Autant-Lara in Diable au corps (US: Devil in the Flesh), 1947.
  12. Anne Vernon, Les parapluies de Cherbourg (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg), France-West Germany, 1963.     Auteur Jacques Demy asked Presle to join Catherine Deneuve inhis musical – but as her mother!Perfectly reasonable as Presle was 21 years older. Fortunately for her image, she had a better offer – co-starring with Paul Newman in The Prize. She later worked with Demy and Deneuve in two films – sans maternity issues.
  13. Liselotte Pulver, La Religieuse (The Nun), France, 1965.    “At first, I was rather disappointed,” Presle toldStéphane Lambert in 2007. “I thought Jacques Rivette wanted me for the frivolous nun, Madame Chelle. But Madame de Mony was another wonderful role.” Both were 18th Century mothers superior at the Longchamps convent of the helpless Sister Anna Karina. “Absolutely perfect,” said Presle.
  14.  Danielle Darrieux, 8 femmes (8 women), France,  2001.   After Charlotte Rampling in  Sous le sable, 1999, auteur François Ozon wanted to film more impeccable actresses  – a la Cukor’s The Women, 1938. Casting icon Dominique Besnehard recalled a creaky, 70’ whodunnit by Robert Thomas: 8 femmes. It proved a decent  launchpad…  now a la Douglas Sirk. At first, Ozon and Besnehard could only come up with 7 femmes, including Catherine Deneuve, who recalled Alfred Hitchcock giving up on another old-fashioned Thomas murder mystery, Man Trap. Ozon’s film became quite an Artmedia talent agency production when Darrieux and Deneuve joined Fanny Ardant, Emmanuelle Beart, Izabelle Huppert, Virginia Ledoyen, Firmine Richard, Ludivine Sagnier. Result: They shared the  Berlin festival’s Silver Bear for “Outstanding Artistic Achievement” in 2002.

 Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls:  14