She was known as a film star, but Jeanne Moreau did so much more with her life, with her career encompassing directing, screenwriting, singing and performing on both stage and screen. She has died aged 89.
Born in Paris in 1928 to a French father and English mother, Moreau began acting on stage and became a leading performer for the Comédie-Française, which provided her grounding even as she didn't recall enjoying the experience. From there, she began working in film, collaborating with some of the most famous directors of the time in their early days, including Louis Malle, François Truffaut, Michelangelo Antonioni, offering up celebrated performances in movies such as Elevator To The Gallows, Les amants, La notte, and Truffaut's Jules And Jim, which she helped the director finance.
Her work in France attracted the attention of Hollywood, and she ended up starring for the likes of Orson Welles and Luc Besson. In addition to acting, she directed a couple of movies, wrote others and appeared on the cover of Time magazine.
Outside of stage and screen, Moreau pursued a singing career, touring nightclubs and performing songs in films. Though her work rate slowed in her later years, she continued acting through 2015, and won a Cesar in 1992 for playing a con artist in The Old Lady Who Wades In The Sea. According to French president Emmanuel Macron, Moreau was "a legend of cinema and theatre... an actress engaged in the whirlwind of life with an absolute freedom."
Married twice, to Jean-Louis Richard and the William Friedkin, she's survived by her actor son, Jerome Richard.