After 75 years of career, the sacred monster of the theater, just as unforgettable in the cinema with Chabrol and Truffaut, had told AFP in 2019 that he would no longer go back on stage, after having made his "merry way".

A giant of the stage, legendary in "The Miser" and "The King is dying", who a few years earlier hoped "never to stop playing".

On the big screen, he was an astonishing Mitterrand in the evening of his life in "Le Promeneur du Champs-de-Mars" by Robert Guédiguian (2004), with a mimicry that will disturb even those close to the former president, and a masterful Javert in "Les Miserables" by Robert Hossein (1982).

He never tired of his roles, weaving and re-embroidering his interpretation, his measured voice suddenly swelling to the audience's surprise, amazed at the energy he retained despite his age.

Michel Bouquet interprets Javert in Les Misérables by Robert Hossein for television, March 29, 1982 in Paris PHILIPPE WOJAZER AFP / Archives

Prolific, often enigmatic and disturbing, the actor had received many awards, including twice the César for best actor: in 2002 for Anne Fontaine's film "How I Killed My Father", then in 2006 for "The Walker of the Champs-de-Mars".

In the theater, he had twice won the Molière for best actor, including in 2005 for "The king is dying", which he played with his wife Juliette Carré, formidable Queen Marguerite.

"At the service" of the author

He left his mark on post-war theater by making the work of Harold Pinter known in France and by putting himself at the service of great classical texts (Molière, Diderot or Strindberg) and contemporary texts (Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, Albert Camus or Thomas Bernhard).

Clearly displaying his preference for the stage, Michel Bouquet was nonetheless a brilliant film actor, endorsing often secretive and equivocal characters with great subtlety.

Michel Bouquet and his wife Juliette Carré, in Paris on January 12, 2016 JOEL SAGET AFP / Archives

Her rather round silhouette, her discreet style and her deep voice, contradicted by a certain playfulness in her gaze, offered her a wide range of roles.

He hammered that the actor was only "at the service" of the author.

"The text, there is only the text. Everything comes from the author. The actor is there only to take the hand of the spectator and make him squeeze the heart of the author", he said.

Or again: "I am in love with the thought of others, it is not useful for the actor to be encumbered with his own thought".

Born on November 6, 1925 in Paris, the son of an officer whom he knew little because he had become a prisoner of war, Michel Bouquet was sent with his brothers to boarding school, an experience which "terrorized" him.

He owes his taste for the spectacle to his mother who took him regularly to the Opéra Comique.

Michel Bouquet in the company of Hélène Seuzaret is Le Malade imaginaire, on September 3, 2008 at the Porte Saint-Martin theater in Paris STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN AFP / Archives

"Each time the curtain rose, there was no longer the horror of the war, there were no longer the Germans around (...), the unreal world far exceeded the real world. That was the best lesson of my life," he told AFP in 2019.

"A terrible anguish"

Alternately apprentice pastry chef, dental mechanic, handler during his youth, he went one day to Maurice Escande, member of the Comédie-Française, who immediately offered him to take his lessons.

Integrating the Conservatory at the same time as Gérard Philipe, he went on stage in 1944, quickly becoming a companion of Jean Anouilh then of Jean Vilar at the TNP (Théâtre national populaire) and at the Festival d'Avignon.

Michel Bouquet made a knight of the Legion of Honor by Francois Hollande in the company of his wife Juliette Carré, at the Elysee Palace on March 17, 2017 PHILIPPE WOJAZER POOL/AFP/Archives

From 1947, we also find him in the credits of many films but he will have to wait until the 1960s to achieve notoriety.

His neutral and calm voice, his taste for ambiguity will do wonders in the films of Claude Chabrol who employs him in the roles of provincial notables, secrets and rogue.

He forged a lasting bond with this director and acted in several of his films ("The Unfaithful Woman", "Chicken in Vinegar").

He also played with François Truffaut in some of his best films ("The bride was in black", in 1967, and "The Mississippi Mermaid" in 1968).

Michel Bouquet performs Pauvre Bitos by Jean Anouilh, in Paris on October 13, 1956 – AFP/Archives

He triumphed on stage with "The King is Dying", which he played from 1994 and then almost continuously from 2004 to 2014.

Playing was an intimate necessity more than a pleasure.

"It's a terrible anguish," he said.

"But it's interesting. To experience something that you wouldn't experience otherwise. You risk nothing, nothing, except to break your face".

© 2022 AFP