Francis Blanche

Acting

Francis Blanche

Born 1921-07-20 · Paris, France

François Jean Blanche, known as "Francis Blanche" (20 July 1921 – 6 July 1974) was a French actor, singer, humorist and author. He was a very popular figure on stage, radio and in films, during the 1950s and 1960s. His two daughters, Barbara & Dominique, are artists with their studios in Eze. Blanche was born in an artistic family, mainly of stage actors—including his father Louis Blanche and his uncle, Emmanuel Blanche, who was a painter—. He completed his secondary schooling at fourteen, the youngest in France to do so at the time. In the 1940s and 1950s, Blanche was part of Robert Dhéry's theatrical company Les Branquignols, with whom he played in the film Ah! Les belles bacchantes, starring Robert Dhéry, Colette Brosset (Dhéry's then-wife), and Louis de Funès; directed by Jean Loubignac in 1954. Blanche teamed up with Pierre Dac to form a comic duo best remembered for Le Sâr Rabindranath Duval, a sketch about a phony and nonsensical Indian clairvoyant and guru (1957). They also created a popular and equally nonsensical radiophonic series, loosely based on a highly improbable espionage and conspiration plot, Malheur aux barbus, which was broadcast on Paris Inter in 213 episodes from 1951 to 1952. The same plot and characters were revived on Europe 1 in a series called Signé Furax, enjoying no less than 1,034 daily episodes between 1956 and 1960. Both broadcasts were phenomenal audience successes in the pre-television era. Blanche was also renowned for broadcasting phone pranks, in which he entertained listeners by making the most improbable situations sound plausible. He wrote poems, and the lyrics of 673 songs. On stage, he acted in Tartuffe and Néron and, in 1955, Chevalier du Ciel, an operetta by Luis Mariano at the Gaîté-Lyrique theatre. Blanche also enjoyed a successful cinematographic career, both as an actor and scriptwriter. He appeared as a hard-headed German colonel ("Obersturmführer Schulz") opposite Brigitte Bardot in Babette s'en va-t-en guerre (1959). He was one of the favourite actors of French filmmaker Georges Lautner, and played Maître Folace (a shady solicitor counselling a colourful gangster mob) in Les Tontons flingueurs (1963). Blanche also appeared in Boris Vassilief's Les Barbouzes (1964). He delighted in parodying classical music, adapting famous works such as Schubert's "Die Forelle" (The Trout) into a crazy and slightly risqué piece about a 16-year-old romantic girl obsessed with Schubert's song to the point of giving birth to a live trout while performing it on her piano. Similarly, he turned Beethoven's 5th Symphony into a lengthy and quite repetitive musical glorification of the clothes peg and its fictitious inventor, Jérémie-Victor Opdebec. Blanche died at the age of 52, from a heart attack with a background of untreated Type 1 diabetes. He is buried in Èze cemetery. Source: Article "Francis Blanche" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Acting credits

Belle de Jour poster
7.3

Beautiful young housewife Séverine Serizy cannot reconcile her masochistic fantasies with her everyday life alongside dutiful husband Pierre. When her lovestruck friend Henri mentions a secretive high-class brothel run by Madame Anais, Séverine begins to work there during the day under the name Belle de Jour. But when one of her clients grows possessive, she must try to go back to her normal life.

Belle de Jour

1967

No artwork available
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Actualités télérévisées

1964

The Black Tulip poster
6.3

Aristocrat Guillaume de Saint Preux leads a double life as a masked bandit known as the Black Tulip. The Black Tulip only robs rich aristocrats, so the local peasants regard him as a hero. Baron La Mouche is convinced Guillaume is the Tulip. During a robbery, he scars the Tulip's face, and hopes to use this to expose Guillaume, but Guillaume is one step ahead.

The Black Tulip

1964

The Great Spy Chase poster
6.8

A cold-war spy parody. After the death of an armaments manufacturer, an international group of spies is drawn into a high-stakes battle of wits to obtain the valuable military patents which have been inherited by the lovely widow.

The Great Spy Chase

1964

The Eroticist poster
5.6

Senator Pupis feels a strong and uncontrollable urge to grab women's bottoms, a habit than can lead to embarrassment, especially if the woman in question is head of another state and the occasion a state visit. In his desperation Pupis turns to the clergy for spiritual and psychological help.

The Eroticist

1972

Love and the Frenchwoman poster
4.9

The seven stages in the life of the modern Frenchwomen are disclosed by seven directors in a witty way: 1 - Childhood, 2 - Adolescence, 3 - Virginity, 4 - Marriage, 5 - Adultery, 6 - Divorce, 7 - The Single Woman.

Love and the Frenchwoman

1960

Good Enough to Eat poster
6.8

Rose Chaperon is asked by her confectioner mother Mathilde to bring jewels to her sick grandmother, Madame de Mergrand. But Hugues, the latter's brother, is prepared to do anything to get his hands on the loot. To this end he hires a villainous young man, Jean-Louis nicknamed Loup, to do the job. Will Loup engulf and devour Little "Rose "Riding Hood?

Good Enough to Eat

1951

The Oldest Profession poster
5.0

A collection of sketches that tells the story of prostitution through the ages.

The Oldest Profession

1967

Les baratineurs poster
5.0

A precious work of art from the Italian Renaissance is stolen and passes through many hands before ending up in the shed of the farmhouse of Mr. and Mrs. Dujardin, fishmongers, who are inaugurating their luxury fish shop that very day. But the antique dealers, the free-riders and the bargain-hunters are there. They are jealously careful not to pass on the fruit of their clever investigations to their rivals, for all of them, after a picturesque treasure hunt, know that the Dujardin family own the famous Duranti altarpiece. But where have they hidden it themselves?

Les baratineurs

1965

Le canard en fer blanc poster
5.4

In South America, airplane pilot François Cartier is searching for treasure for a group of political exiles who helped him escape the death penalty. But the members of the group are being murdered one by one. Having managed to get his hands on the loot, François will use it to exchange it for a beautiful revolutionary with whom he has fallen in love. But the return flight proves particularly perilous.

Le canard en fer blanc

1967

Adieu Berthe poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Adieu Berthe

1970

Les gros malins poster
5.0

Paul Blanc runs a butcher's shop with his Neapolitan wife, the vivacious Giulia. One night, thanks to sleeping pills received from his brother in Argentina, he dreams of horse racing and sees in his dream the order of arrival of the horses. Giulia praises her husband's gift at the local café. But the turfmen dissuade her from betting on the nags chosen by Paul, who they consider to be real losers! But her vision proves to be right. When her secret is discovered, everyone wants to buy this miracle medicine. But the product is no longer manufactured, as it is considered dangerous and has been banned by the authorities.

Les gros malins

1969

Les Gorilles poster
6.4

A confused pair of airport luggage carriers get involved in the disappearance of some suitcases.

Les Gorilles

1964

The Stud poster
4.9

Veterinary surgeon William Chaminade is having a peaceful holiday in the South of France when he is witness to an event that will change not only his life but the destiny of France! A young woman tries to kill herself by jumping from the upstairs window of the hotel where he is staying. Thanks to the services of a passing athlete, the woman is unharmed, and she reveals that her distress is down to her husband’s apparent lack of interest in her. Immediately, Chaminade has a brainwave. He will open a special centre for people like this unfortunate young woman, who will be able to satisfy their romantic needs, at the tax payers’ expense. All is well until this innovative ’pleasure centre’ draws the attention of an over-zealous tax inspector, Dupuis...

The Stud

1970

Le Solitaire poster
6.5

No synopsis available yet.

Le Solitaire

1973

The Girl of a Thousand Months poster
5.5

A fashion designer rents his villa to a woman before leaving to go abroad. The daughter of the woman is forced to pretend to be handicapped in a dark conspiracy aimed to prevent the man from leaving.

The Girl of a Thousand Months

1961

Erotissimo poster
5.7

Annie is a middle-age wife, still sexy and pampered by her husband, Phillippe, who is the owner and general manager of a dynamic company. Under the deluge of sexy Swedish movies, sexy advertising on the streets, sexy intimate clothing in ladies' shops, and even talks about sex and marital infidelity with her mother and female friends, Annie starts feeling left aside by her husband, and trying to attract in a number of ways - and failing. It's not the all-purpose secretary at the office that is keeping him late, it's a tax expert that, asking the most innocent questions, is finding out how Philippe can manage a company without profits, and still manage a home, may be two... with high quality levels.

Erotissimo

1969

Who Stole the Body? poster
7.0

Edouard and Félix work in a real estate agency. One day, they are threatened with dismissal if they don't manage to sell a very isolated house to an elderly, silver and somewhat unusual Englishwoman. In the house, they discover a corpse. The visit is spent dragging the corpse from room to room, cupboard to chest, so as not to frighten the otherwise impressed buyer. But the corpse disappears. He has to be found before the deed can be signed. The two salesmen become detectives, tracking down the dead man's many female acquaintances. All the seducer's conquests are sifted through, to find the one who left her jewels at the scene of the crime.

Who Stole the Body?

1963

La Dernière Bourrée à Paris poster
5.5

Young Berthe, deeply moved by a cinema screening of the notoriously sultry Le Dernier Tango à Paris, goes to the address where most of the action takes place, a building overlooking the Bir-Hakeim Bridge metro station. Reality suddenly seems to mimic fiction when she discovers not only an apartment advertised for rent, but also a man prostrate in a corner who seems to be waiting for her. Hoping for the same torrid embrace as in the film, she discovers that he is in fact preoccupied only by the apartment's defects. Attempting to embark on a passionate affair, she learns that the man suffers from libido problems.

La Dernière Bourrée à Paris

1973

Crooks in Clover poster
7.7

An aging gangster, Fernand Naudin is hoping for a quiet retirement when he suddenly inherits a fortune from an old friend, a former gangster supremo known as the Mexican. If he is ambivalent about his new found wealth, Fernand is positively nonplussed to discover that he has also inherited his benefactor’s daughter, Patricia. Unfortunately, not only does Fernand have to put up with the thoroughly modern Patricia and her nauseating boyfriend, but he also had to contend with the Mexican’s trigger-happy former employees, who are determined to make a claim.

Crooks in Clover

1963

Rita the Field Marshal poster
5.2

A waitress helps a scientist flee the Nazis.

Rita the Field Marshal

1967

Un merveilleux parfum d'oseille poster
6.0

Baron Yves de Kerfunte learns of his uncle's death. Overjoyed, he is astonished to discover that seven other individuals are vying for the inheritance. Worse still, when they open the will, they learn that only the elderly Louise de Kerfunte is the heiress, and that she intends to squander the money quickly.

Un merveilleux parfum d'oseille

1969

Babette Goes to War poster
5.6

Beautiful housekeeper Babette travels to England after the Nazis invade France. There, British intelligence devise a plan for Babette to sneak back home, where she could use her feminine charm on key Nazi officer Schulz, gleaning valuable information for England. However, Babette, although willing and spirited, is naïve and untrained, making her less than ideal for matters of national security.

Babette Goes to War

1959

Clémentine chérie poster
6.2

Gaston Bellus, is the director of a textile house, and the research laboratory makes a sensational discovery: the elastic fabric. This new discovery is used to manufacture new modern stretchable bathing suits. His daughter Clementine, enters the beauty pageant to represent France for the swimsuit launch. But scandal ensues when the public soon discover, the photos of the event in which this new revolutionary material is completely invisible on photographs & live television.

Clémentine chérie

1964

Behind the camera

La Grande Bouffe poster
7.1

Four friends gather at a villa with the intention of eating themselves to death.

La Grande Bouffe

1973

Signé Furax poster
5.0

The notorious and mysterious criminal Furax steals France's famous monuments, replacing them with replicas.

Signé Furax

1981

Tartarin de Tarascon poster
5.3

A well-to-do bourgeois, Tartarin lives in Tarascon, a small southern town, among friends who, like him, love hunting "à la casquette", gossip, aperitifs and thought-provoking journeys. Imaginative like all his compatriots, Tartarin ended up believing he had once been to Shanghai, so fervently did he recount his illusory adventures. It was even rumored that Tartarin was about to leave for Africa to hunt wild beasts, and this was so insistent that the brave man, urged on by his friends, was forced "for the sake of honor" to embark. He arrives in Casablanca, surprised to discover a modern city and not a single lion. But a charming Moorish woman, Baïa, seduces him, and Tartarin indulges in the "delights of Capua". This euphoria is short-lived: Baïa disappears, a false prince, mostly a swindler, finds a replacement and sets off on a hunting expedition in southern Morocco, which will only earn Tartarin the loss of his savings and a blind old lion dragged along by two beggars.

Tartarin de Tarascon

1962

Trust Me! poster
6.2

Max, an illusionist as unlucky as he is skilled, would like to marry his boss's daughter, but his boss won't hear of marriage and even threatens to fire him if he doesn't come up with an interesting act. A supplier of magic items comes to Marx's rescue, handing over his "magic clock". Marx locks himself in to experiment with it and, unable to get out, falls asleep... He has a dream in which, with the power to make false things true, he becomes the hero of extraordinary adventures that take him to an Eastern country where he is made Emperor. He calls Helen to marry him, but the deposed Emperor takes revenge by having the usurper locked up in a sarcophagus.

Trust Me!

1954