Philippe Léotard

Philippe Léotard his full name was Ange Philippe Paul André LéotardTomasi 28 August 1940 25 August 2001 was a French actor poet and singer He was born in Nice one of seven children four girls then three boys of which he was the oldest and was the brother of politician François Léotard His childhood was normal except for an illness rheumatic fever which struck him and forced him to spend days in bed during which time he read a great many books He was particularly fond of the poets Baudelaire Rimbaud Lautréamont Blaise Cendrars He met Ariane Mnouchkine at the Sorbonne and in 1964 Together with students of the LÉcole Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq they formed the Parisian avantgarde stage ensemble Théâtre du Soleil He played Philippe the tormented son of a woman with terminal illness in the 1974 drama film La Gueule ouverte by the controversial director Maurice Pialat He won a César Award for Best Actor for his role in the 1982 movie La Balance One of his few Englishlanguage roles was a cameo in the 1973 thriller The Day of the Jackal and he costarred as Jacques in the 1975 John Frankenheimer movie French Connection II which starred Gene Hackman and Fernando Rey sequel to The French Connection Léotard died of respiratory failure in Paris on 25 August 2001 three days before his 61st birthday He was buried at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris Description above from the Wikipedia article Philippe Léotard licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia