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Actor turned writer/director Vincent Perez began his career as French
cinema's "jeune premier romantique," its young, pretty-faced romantic.
Journalists dubbed him "monsieur heartthrob" and a "nice bit of Europe-crumpet";
the readers of Paris Match magazine elected him the World's Sexiest French
Speaker. He starred in a series of European costume dramas, in which he romanced
France's top leading ladies -- Emmanuelle Béart, Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle
Adjani -- and showed a penchant for full-frontal nude scenes. But he also
matured into one of Europe's most gifted players, winning the prestigious Jean
Gabin Prize and garnering several César nominations. He worked all over the
world with many of cinema's greatest filmmakers before beginning his own
promising directing career. While still admired for his charming good looks,
Perez is ultimately known for his accomplishments and widely praised for his
talents.
Born in Lausanne, Switzerland, Perez is the middle child of a German mother and
a Spanish father. An imaginative youngster, he spent the majority of his time
drawing pictures and composing stories. Perez idolized Charlie Chaplin and soon
became interested in writing and producing films. He began putting on shows at
school, which he would star in and direct. Yet, he dreamed of being a painter,
sculptor, or photographer, and eventually dropped out to enter photography
school. While there, he worked as a photographer's apprentice and took art
classes. But the solitary lifestyle of an artist frightened him and, fearing
that he would become too lonely, Perez quickly returned to acting. He enrolled
at the Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in Geneva, where he studied before moving
to Paris in 1984. He spent two years at the celebrated Conservatory of Dramatic
Arts in Paris and then transferred to the experimental Ecole des Amandiers de
Nanterre, where he trained under famed theater and opera director Patrice
Chéreau. Perez impressed Chéreau, who cast the actor in many of his plays and is
often credited with discovering him.
While still in school, the actor made his big-screen debut in Jean-Pierre
Limosin's Gardien de la Nuit (Night Guardian) (1986). Chéreau then tapped Perez
for his screen adaptation of Anton Chekov's Hôtel de France (1987), in which he
stood out among ten fellow actors from Nanterre. He went on to star opposite
Jacqueline Bisset in La Maison de Jade (The House of Jade) (1988) and as Laerte
in a French television production of Hamlet (1988). A year later, at the
insistence of star Gérard Depardieu, director Jean-Paul Rappeneau cast Perez in
the role of the tongue-tied Christian de Neuvillette in his version of Cyrano de
Bergerac (1990). Perez's standout performance in the internationally acclaimed
film earned him a César nomination for Most Promising Young Actor.
After winning the Jean Gabin Prize for his work in the World War II drama La
Neige et le Feu (Snow and Fire) (1991), Perez landed the romantic lead in Régis
Wargnier's Indochine (Indochina) (1992). The Academy Award-winning period film
starred Perez as a French officer stationed in Indochina who seduces a
plantation owner (Catherine Deneuve) before falling in love with her adopted
Indochinese daughter. With his reputation as a sex symbol now firmly
established, Perez mocked himself in the romantic comedy Fanfan (1993) by
playing a former lothario abstaining from sex (with French vixen Sophie Marceau)
in order to make a relationship work. He then returned to costume dramas to star
in Chéreau's magnificent La Reine Margot (Queen Margot) (1994). Based on
Alexandre Dumas' novel, the bloody historical epic featured Perez as La Môle, a
protestant noble who sacrifices himself for Margot (Isabelle Adjani). La Reine
Margot took home the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and several César
Awards.
Perez went on to join John Malkovich, Fanny Ardant, and Marcello Mastroianni in
the international cast of Michelangelo Antonioni and Wim Wenders' four-part,
multi-language collaboration, Par-Delà les Nuages (Beyond the Clouds) (1995).
Starring in the film's final segment, he portrayed a young man who falls deeply
in love with a beautiful girl (Irène Jacob) just as she is about to enter a
convent.
Already a star in Europe, Perez began the second half of the '90s by signing on
to three English-language films. Director Tim Pope, whom Perez had met briefly
after finishing Le Reine Margot, tapped him to replace the late Brandon Lee in
the sequel to 1994's The Crow, The Crow: City of Angels (1996). Beeban Kidron
cast him as a shipwrecked Russian opposite Rachel Weisz in Swept From the Sea
(1997), her adaptation of Joseph Conrad's novella Amy Foster. Miramax, Le Reine
Margot's U.S. distributor, offered him the lead role in Nick Hamm's adaptation
of Kate O'Brien's novel Mary Lavelle. Titled Talk of Angels (1998), the film
featured Perez as an aristocrat's son who falls in love with an Irish nanny
(Polly Walker) at the start of the Spanish Civil War.
Before Talk of Angels' release, the actor returned to French cinema to play a
Duke in the swashbuckler Le Bossu (On Guard!) (1997) and earned his second César
nomination. He then appeared as a Serbian Army sniper in HBO's Shot Through the
Heart (1998), and as a transsexual in Chéreau's Ceux Qui M'Aiment Prendront le
Train (Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train) (1999), for which he received
another César nod.
The new millennium saw Perez continuing to work successfully in both Europe and
Hollywood, portraying such memorable real-life figures as the 18th century
French philosopher Denis Diderot in Le Libertin (The Libertine) (2000), Kuki
Gallmann's (played by Kim Basinger) husband Paolo in I Dreamed of Africa (2000),
and Viennese painter Oskar Kokoschka in Bruce Beresford's Bride of the Wind
(2001). He also gave a scene-stealing performance as the Roman vampire Marius in
Michael Rymer's adaptation of Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles, The Queen of
the Damned (2002), before earning the title role in a remake of Fanfan la Tulipe
(2003).
Over the course of his acting career, Perez began directing short films and made
it his goal to helm a feature before turning 40. On the set of Indochine, he
collaborated with the picture's director, Régis Wargnier, on L'Éxchange (1992),
a short starring his Indochine co-stars Dominique Blanc and Andrzej Seweryn. The
piece, which earned a Golden Palm nomination for Best Short at the Cannes Film
Festival, so impressed Roman Polanski that the celebrated filmmaker called Perez
four times in an effort to convince him to direct a feature film. In 1999, Perez
received his second Golden Palm nomination for Rien Dire, a short written by his
wife, actress Karine Sylla. The two then co-wrote Perez's feature-film
directorial debut, Peau D'Ange (2002). Financed by Luc Besson's production
company, Europa Corp., the film began shooting one month shy of Perez's 37th
birthday.
Source:
movies2.nytimes.com
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