Catherine Deneuve In The Truth – Artistic Longevity | The Great Acting Blog

Catherine Deneuve in The Truth.

Jimmy Stewart once said that he would quit acting when he no longer liked himself on screen. I thought this was a pretty good rule to go by and so I adopted it for myself. I also thought that age would be the deciding factor – it seemed rare to me that any actor did any of their strongest work during their later years. The obvious physical decline, the dimunition of energy, a loss of creative rigor, the loss of that zing, and a changing of priorities seemed inevitable for all actors. That is until I saw Catherine Deneuve’s performance in Hirokazu Kore-eda’s The Truth – it is striking to the extent that it has forced me to re-examine my beliefs on acting and aging.

Deneuve plays Fabienne Dangeville, a Cesar-winning grand dame of the French cinema. The character’s echo of Deneuve’s own life is obvious, but how much of Kore-eda’s script is based on Deneuve is difficult to discern. Although in an interview with Filmmaker Magazine, the director stated the following; ‘When Catherine Deneuve agreed to appear, I conducted a long interview with her about her own career. So her own experiences and emotions are definitely reflected in the final film.’  He adds; ‘Catherine Deneuve was quite clear from the beginning that she was nothing like Fabienne. So she was able to distance herself from the character and sort of chuckle about her.‘

Dangeville is visited at home by her daughter, a New York-based screenwriter – Juliette Binoche – along with her husband, a sort of second-rate American TV actor beautifully played by Ethan Hawke, and their young daughter.  Dangeville has recently published her memoirs which in turn creates family strife because Binoche views them more or less as a work of fiction. Against this backdrop, there is a film-within-a-film; we see Dangeville at work on the set of a sci-fi feature, where she is determined not to be outdone by the young starlet playing the lead. Dangeville is vain, self-centred, competitive, ruthless, unappreciative of the work of her entourage, but she is also charming, witty, mischievous, charismatic and serious about her art.

Catherine Deneuve’s performance as Fabienne Dangeville is one of the strongest in her extraordinary body of work. It would be a classic by any actor, but what makes Deneuve’s performance here so striking is that she delivers it at the age of 75. Most would have retired from acting altogether by this stage of life, but Deneuve is busily doing some of her best work. In Hirokazu Kore-eda’s The Truth, she is vibrant and vivid; her wit and charisma are intact, her playfulness and intent are unabashed, and she still posesses an intense emotional energy, mostly revealed through the eyes. And critically, she maintains her creative appetite even after appearing in well over 100 films stretching back to 1957. Again, most actors seem jaded at this point, but Deneuve’s creativity is as focussed as it ever was.

What’s the secret then? Why is Deneuve so unusual in maintaining the standard of her work well into her 70s? What is it about her that enables her to do that?

Might we look back at her early performances during the 1960s and see in her reserve and her coolness a young soul setting itself up for the long haul?

Deneuve is a minimalist. She has never been an especially physical actor, nor has she relied on emotional force in the way that, say, Claudia Cardinale did. Deneuve’s is the art of witholding. She pares it back, giving importance to the small details of performance, so that when something does happen – a flicker of emotion across the eyes, a gesture with the arm – it is expressive. Her aesthetic is inside-out to that of most other actors. By her own admission she is an instinctive introvert, and it is this introversion, this desire to withold, coupled with the automatic exhibitionism that comes with standing in front of a camera, that produces her fascinating on-screen tension. Deneuve is cool, still, precise, she doesn’t strain when many actors do – she channels rather summons. This minimalist aesthetic is less reliant on energy levels, and more about the actor’s relationship to camera. It is a spiritual, concentrated form of acting and therefore does not require the body to be in the shape of an Olympic athelete. Naturally then, this minimlism would more easily cope with the aging process, take it in it’s stride, may even benefit from it.

Another clue to the longevity of Deneuve’s excellence may rest within the film itself. The Truth features some lovely meta-moments when Deneuve’s Dangeville discusses acting itself. In one such scene she imparts the following to Ethan Hawke…

” Save your energy for your acting … it’s not a job you can do halfway …. the daily grind doesn’t matter … you know what I think? … When actresses start getting involved in charity and politics … they’ve lost, vis a vis the profession. They’ve lost the battle on screen, so they dive into reality. They pretend to fight against reality . Understand? It’s not the contrary. I’ve always won that battle. That’s why I can withstand solitude. ”

Yes, it’s difficult to discern how much of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s script is influenced by Deneuve’s own life and work, but one senses that the bit of philosophy imparted above, would meet with her approval. To live in solitude and fight against reality is to live in one’s imagination. In addition to a minimal aesthetic then, the maintenance of a potent imaginary life is intrinsic to artistic longevity.

The Truth, UK poster

Catherine Deneuve in The Truth

Hirokazu Kore-eda, Catherine Deneuve and Ethan Hawke

RELATED READING
A Lesson From Catherine Deneuve In Belle De Jour – Accentuate Your Individuality
Catherine Deneuve In The Hunger – Compassion And Acceptance

RESOURCES
Hirokazu Kore-eda – Interview in Filmmaker Magazine

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