At the origin of this collection, an appeal from a relative, the former president of the Cinémathèque française Serge Toubiana, to his knowledge in the world of cinema, to help the actor, who was according to him in a very precarious psychic, physical and financial situation, affected in particular by the death of Jean-Luc Godard in September.
These requests were coupled with the opening of an online fundraiser, at the initiative of the head of the Association of Friends of François Truffaut, Armand Hennon.
Result: many marks of emotion on social networks and more than 18,000 euros offered in three days by 400 admirers of the actor.
"Although deeply affected by the death of Jean-Luc Godard, with whom we were still exchanging a few months ago about a future project, I nevertheless want to reassure my friends: I am thanks to them much better, and intend to find very soon the path of filming!", said Jean-Pierre Léaud Wednesday evening, in a statement sent to AFP.
"I express my deep gratitude and emotion at the many messages of affection received from all continents. The testimonies of your generosity, which I receive as so many marks of friendship, will be of precious help to me for my daily life", he continues, thanking Mr. Toubiana and the Friends of François Truffaut for their friendship and their "solicitude".
Serge Toubiana had explained to AFP to have recently found Jean-Pierre Léaud very affected, in the Paris apartment of his wife, herself "very tired".
"I asked him what would please them. He told me they would have to go out in the sun, swim," he said.
Inseparable from the cinema of François Truffaut, who created for him the character of Antoine Doinel, from "400 blows" to "Love on the run", Léaud was very touched by the successive disappearance of the great figures of the time, and lives in precarious conditions, especially on the psychic level, he added.
"We will give him this money and see what his most urgent needs are," added Armand Hennon, adding that he did not know the exact financial situation of the actor.
More than sixty years after the New Wave, Jean-Pierre Léaud is the best known of the living faces of this movement that revolutionized cinema. At the end of May, another figure, the discreet director Jacques Rozier, died at the age of 96, two years after being the subject of a solidarity movement because he was evicted from his home.
© 2023 AFP