Alain Cuny

René Xavier Marie Alain Cuny (12 July 1908 – 16 May 1994) was a French actor of stage and screen. He was closely linked with the works of Paul Claudel and Antonin Artaud, and for his performances for the Théâtre national populaire and Odéon-Théâtre de France. His film work included collaborations with directors Marcel Carné, Louis Malle, Jean-Luc Godard, Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Francesco Rosi, and Luis Buñuel. He was nominated for the César Award for Best Supporting Actor for the 1988 film Camille Claudel, and won the Joseph Plateau Lifetime Achievement Award in 1992. Early life René Xavier Marie Alain Cuny was born in Saint-Malo, Brittany. He was brought up by an aunt and spent a large part of his childhood with her, in Boucé, and spent several years in an orphanage. He developed an early interest in painting and from the age of 15 he attended the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He met Picasso, Braque and members of the surrealist group. He then began working in the film industry as a costume, poster and set designer and was employed on films of Cavalcanti, Feyder and Renoir. After a meeting with the actor-manager Charles Dullin, Cuny was persuaded to study drama and he began acting on stage in the late 1930s. Career