Jean Anouilh

Writing

Jean Anouilh

Born 1910-06-23 · Bordeaux, Gironde, France

Jean Marie Lucien Pierre Anouilh (23 June 1910 – 3 October 1987) was a French dramatist whose career spanned five decades. Though his work ranged from high drama to absurdist farce, Anouilh is best known for his 1944 play Antigone, an adaptation of Sophocles' classical drama, that was seen as an attack on Marshal Pétain's Vichy government. His plays are less experimental than those of his contemporaries, having clearly organized plot and eloquent dialogue. One of France's most prolific writers after World War II, much of Anouilh's work deals with themes of maintaining integrity in a world of moral compromise. Anouilh was born in Cérisole, a small village on the outskirts of Bordeaux, and had Basque ancestry. His father, François Anouilh, was a tailor, and Anouilh maintained that he inherited from him a pride in conscientious craftmanship. He may owe his artistic bent to his mother, Marie-Magdeleine, a violinist who supplemented the family's meager income by playing summer seasons in the casino orchestra in the nearby seaside resort of Arcachon. Marie-Magdeleine worked the night shifts in the music-hall orchestras and sometimes accompanied stage presentations, affording Anouilh ample opportunity to absorb the dramatic performances from backstage. He often attended rehearsals and solicited the resident authors to let him read scripts until bedtime. He first tried his hand at playwriting here, at the age of 12, though his earliest works do not survive. In 1918 the family moved to Paris where the young Anouilh received his secondary education at the Lycée Chaptal. Jean-Louis Barrault, later a major French director, was a pupil there at the same time and recalls Anouilh as an intense, rather dandified figure who hardly noticed a boy some two years younger than himself. He earned acceptance into the law school at the Sorbonne but, unable to support himself financially, he left after just 18 months to seek work as a copywriter at the advertising agency Publicité Damour. He liked the work, and spoke more than once with wry approval of the lessons in the classical virtues of brevity and precision of language he learned while drafting advertising copy. ... Source: Article "Jean Anouilh" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Acting credits

Behind the camera

Anna Karenina poster
6.0

In Imperial Russia, Anna, wife of the officer Karenin, goes to Moscow to visit her brother. On the way, she meets charming cavalry officer Vronsky, to whom she's immediately attracted— but in St. Petersburg’s high society, a relationship like this could destroy a woman’s reputation.

Anna Karenina

1948

Dear Caroline poster
5.5

France, July 1782. During her birthday, the beautiful young Marchioness Caroline meets the attractive soldier Gaston. It's love at first sight but Gaston does not wish to make a commitment because a military career waits for him. Caroline marries then a politician but the French Revolution bursts and Caroline has to run away to escape the guillotine. By running away she meets Gaston again who decides to help her.

Dear Caroline

1951

Circle of Love poster
5.7

In a chain reaction of romantic adventures, various people play musical beds in a remake of Max Ophul's "La Ronde."

Circle of Love

1964

No artwork available
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Eurydice

1957

A Trap for Cinderella poster
5.9

Based on Sébastien Japrisot's novel, the story revolves around a young girl who suffers from amnesia after surviving a terrible fire.

A Trap for Cinderella

1965

The Lark poster
NR

Adaptation of Jean Anouilh's 1952 play about Joan of Arc, the young girl who led the French to victory against the English in the Hundred Years' War.

The Lark

1957

Two Pennies Worth of Violets poster
4.7

Thérèse, a young flower girl, tries hard to remain virtuous but the whole world seems to conspire against her, whether her petty Paris family, or her relatives in the province bristling with false respectability, or her lustful employer, or the boy she loves who seduces her and abandons her. But at the end of the day there is Yvon, her childhood friend. Will he be the one that will love her truly?

Two Pennies Worth of Violets

1951

The Traveler Without Luggage poster
7.3

Having lost his memory due to serving in World War I, Gaston has spent the past 15 years in a psychiatric hospital. Due to his large disability pension fund, several families claim him as their missing son. Gaston is introduced to the Renaud family by the Duchess Dupont-Dufort and her lawyer. The Renaud family attempt to revive Gaston's memory with stories of his past, but he is apalled by some of the things he hears and dislikes the man he is supposed to be.

The Traveler Without Luggage

1944

The Traveler Without Luggage poster
7.3

Having lost his memory due to serving in World War I, Gaston has spent the past 15 years in a psychiatric hospital. Due to his large disability pension fund, several families claim him as their missing son. Gaston is introduced to the Renaud family by the Duchess Dupont-Dufort and her lawyer. The Renaud family attempt to revive Gaston's memory with stories of his past, but he is apalled by some of the things he hears and dislikes the man he is supposed to be.

The Traveler Without Luggage

1944

Monsieur Vincent poster
6.6

The life of Vincent de Paul, the 17th-century author and priest who founded two religious orders.

Monsieur Vincent

1947

The Passion of Slow Fire poster
6.7

Stéphane Blanchon lives a quiet life in Switzerland with his wife, Christine, until a young American boarder named Belle, who was living with them, is found murdered. Despite Stéphane's innocence, the evidence points to him, and he learns that Belle harbored romantic feelings for him. Suspicions mount against him; even Christine thinks he is the culprit. Stéphane's sanity begins to crumble, and he lashes out in unprecedented ways.

The Passion of Slow Fire

1961

Cavalcade of Love poster
5.8

Cavalcade D'Amour is divided into three sections, each depicting a romance occurring within the walls of the Chateau de Champs. Legend has it that whoever marries in the Chateau is doomed to an unhappy life. This proves to be the case in 1639 and 1839, but the heroine of the 1939 segment, Corinne Luchaire, is determined to break the jinx. She is convinced that she will prove an unsuitable bride for Claude Dauphin, and he is likewise convinced that he will turn out to be an inadequate groom. But the couple's respective families will not be dissuaded, and the marriage takes place as scheduled? with unexpectedly happy results!

Cavalcade of Love

1939

The Knight of the Night poster
6.1

Paris, 1884. Bella Fontanges, a renowned ballerina, is married to Georges de Segar. But after just a few years together, the couple slowly sinks into weariness. Bella has forgotten what happiness used to taste like. Then a mysterious squire appears. Aware of the couple's faltering situation, he makes Bella and Georges a most astonishing proposal: he claims to be able to separate Good from Evil in Georges. Reluctant at first, the couple eventually agrees to play along. But it's not long before they realize that in Georges, it's Evil that has prevailed.

The Knight of the Night

1953

No artwork available
NR

A young man wants to give an idealized image of himself and his family and so he introduces the girl he loves to two old actors who pretend to be his parents.

Appuntamento a Senlis

1972

A Time for Loving poster
5.0

The story of an apartment in Paris and the various people that occupy it over the years.

A Time for Loving

1972

Twentieth Century Theatre: Colombe poster
7.0

A diva of the Paris stage transforms her mousy daughter-in-law into an attractive ingenue to spite her hated son, away on military service.

Twentieth Century Theatre: Colombe

1960

Confessions of a Newlywed poster
5.5

A timid young man marries the daughter of the entomologist he works for. On the train for their honeymoon, he takes his young wife in his arms when a customs officer suddenly enters the compartment. The groom is now inhibited.

Confessions of a Newlywed

1937

Il est important d'être aimé poster
10.0

No synopsis available yet.

Il est important d'être aimé

1981

Repetitionen poster
10.0

"The Rehearsal or The Patchwork of Love" - At the Ferbroques castle, the Count, Countess and their guests are rehearsing a play.

Repetitionen

1968

Antigone poster
NR

A 1974 PBS production of Jean Anouilh's 1944 play "Antigone" adapted from the original Sophocles.

Antigone

1974

The Bride of Darkness poster
6.1

Sylvie, a young woman who believes to be cursed, lives in the town of Carcassonne with her guardian, Mr. Toulzac. He is a retired teacher who wishes to discover the secret of the Cathars, a Christian sect of the Middle Ages that glorified death over life. Sylvie meets Roland, a composer who instills new hope into her troubled mind. Mr. Toulzac then asks her then to renounce the world and go down a secret tomb he has just found.

The Bride of Darkness

1945

On m'a volé mon adolescence poster
NR

In the 1960s, Evelyne, a 14-year-old teenager, reluctantly becomes her mother's confidante, who uses her as an excuse for romantic encounters with a work colleague. Evelyne finds this secret very difficult because she loves her father and her 12-year-old younger sister. One day, her mother leaves her husband and her two daughters. Evelyne, feeling guilty, tries to convince her to return home.

On m'a volé mon adolescence

2008

La Nuit des rois poster
NR

In the 15th century, the ship carrying twins Viola and Sebastian is shipwrecked. Viola washes ashore in Illyria, believing herself to be the sole survivor. To better defend herself against the pitfalls of life, she disguises herself as a man and enters the court of Duke Orsino as a page named Cesario...

La Nuit des rois

1973

Marie-Martine poster
6.9

The novelist Loïc Limousin knew the turbulent past of Marie-Martine and he extracted the material for a novel from which the young girl risks paying the price. After the drama that had thrown her in prison, she met a brave boy ready to make his life with her. Will the scandal separate them?

Marie-Martine

1943