Bruno Cremer

Bruno Cremer

1929-10-06 – 2010-08-07 (age 80) Saint-Mandé, Val-de-Marne, France
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Biography

Bruno Jean Marie Cremer (6 October 1929 – 7 August 2010) was a French actor best known for portraying Jules Maigret on French television, from 1991 to 2005.

Bruno Cremer was born in Saint-Mandé, Val-de-Marne, in the eastern suburbs of Paris, France. His mother, Jeanne Rullaert, a musician, was of Belgian Flemish origin and his father, Georges, was a businessman from Lille who, though born French, had taken out Belgian nationality after the French armed forces refused to accept him for service in the First World War. Bruno himself opted for French nationality when he reached the age of 18. His childhood was largely spent in Paris.

Bruno attended the Cours Hattemer, a private school. Having completed his secondary studies, he followed an interest in acting which had interested him since the age of 12 and trained in acting from 1952 at France's highly selective Conservatoire national supérieur d'art dramatique (English: French National Academy of Dramatic Arts).

His career began with ten years spent acting in live theatre, playing roles drawn from works of Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde and Jean Anouilh. Aged already 30, he created the role of Thomas Becket in the 1959 world premiere of Anouilh's Becket, and held Anouilh in veneration all his life. Later Cremer played Max in a French production of Bent by Martin Sherman in 1981. He regarded his basic profession as that of a stage actor, though he gravitated firmly to films.

It was in 1957 that Cremer had his first credited part in a film, Quand la femme s'en mêle (When a woman meddles), which starred Alain Delon. However, it was in 1965 that Cremer's career really began to prosper, with the film La 317e section, (The 317th Platoon), directed by Pierre Schoendoerffer and set in Indochina during the French colonial wars. From then onwards, Cremer became a popular actor and appeared in over 110 productions for cinema and television.

While Cremer tried to avoid labels and typecasting, he tended to be offered tough-guy roles, often military men. Examples from various points in his career include Section spéciale (1975), La légion saute sur Kolwezi (1980) and Là-haut, un roi au-dessus des nuages (2004).

Special Section (French original title: Section spéciale), released in 1975, is about a kangaroo court set up in collaborationist Vichy France to ensure judicial convictions of innocent people so as to mollify the Nazis. A French language film directed by the Greek-French film director Costa-Gavras, it features Cremer as Lucien Sampaix, a Communist journalist.

The 1980 film La légion saute sur Kolwezi (English Operation Leopard), directed by Raoul Coutard, is a documentary-style portrayal of a real-life operation headed by the French Foreign Legion in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1978 to rescue foreign hostages. Cremer plays a military commander. Pierre Schoendoerffer’s 2004 film Là-haut, un roi au-dessus des nuages (Above the Clouds), based on his own novel, Là-haut. Cremer played the Colonel. ...

Source: Article "Bruno Cremer" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA .

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Known For

Sorcerer
Sorcerer

1977

as Victor Manzon / 'Serrano'

Is Paris Burning?
Is Paris Burning?

1966

as Colonel Rol Tanguy

White Wedding
White Wedding

1989

as François Hainaut

Money
Money

1991

as Marc Lavater

The Stranger
The Stranger

1967

as Priest

Tumultes
Tumultes

1990

as The Father

The Assassination
The Assassination

1972

as Michel Vigneau

Ménage
Ménage

1986

as The Art Lover

Under the Sand
Under the Sand

2001

as Jean Drillon

Spy, Stand Up
Spy, Stand Up

1982

as Alain Richard

A Question of Rape
A Question of Rape

1967

as Walter

The 317th Platoon
The 317th Platoon

1965

as L'adjudant Willsdorf

The Suspects
The Suspects

1974

as Police Commissioner Bonetti

Marco the Magnificent
Marco the Magnificent

1965

as Guillaume de Tripoli, a Knight Templar

Fanny Straw-Top
Fanny Straw-Top

1984

as Andrés Gallego

Biribi
Biribi

1971

as Le capitaine

Flesh of the Orchid
Flesh of the Orchid

1975

as Louis Delage

Last In, First Out
Last In, First Out

1978

as Lucas Richter

Hunter Will Get You
Hunter Will Get You

1976

as Gilbert, aka l'Epervier

Operation Leopard
Operation Leopard

1980

as Pierre Delbart