The actor was hospitalized in Grenoble on Tuesday evening in serious condition after a collision with another skier at La Rosière, a winter sports resort in the Alps. He died on Wednesday.
It was the most famous gash in French cinema. A childhood memory, a dog claw. Actor Gaspard Ulliel died at the age of 37 on Wednesday after a skiing accident the day before in the winter sports resort of La Rosière (Savoie). “Victim of a skiing accident” the actor “is dead”, says a brief statement from his agent. The information had been revealed in the middle of the afternoon through the Parisian, which suggests head trauma.
«It is perhaps this doberman who, by scratching his cheek when he was 6 years old, passed on some of his genes to him. Gaspard Ulliel has kept a funny scar under the left cheekbone. A quotation mark left open. A notch that wrinkles when he smiles and then gives him, depending on the mood and the light, something animal. A childish or disturbing side. Sometimes both, and that’s even more disturbing.”, wrote Alexandra Schwartzbrod in Release in 2004, drawing the portrait of this “Angel Face”.
Gaspard Ulliel was known to the general public for films like A long engagement Sunday (2004) by Jean-Pierre Jeunet or Just the end of the world (2016) by Xavier Dolan, which won him the César for best actor in 2017. He played a writer reuniting with his family after twelve years of absence, to whom he came to announce his impending death.
This son of two stylists had also played the famous couturier Yves Saint Laurent in the biopic directed by Bertrand Bonello in 2014. During an eclectic career, he had shot alongside big names in French cinema such as Isabelle Huppert and Gérard Depardieu. He was also the face of a Chanel perfume.
Collision
His last appearance on the screens dates back to last fall when he shared the comedy poster Vengeance at triple gallop by Alex Lutz with Leïla Bekhti and Audrey Lamy. Two years earlier, he starred in the film Sibyl by Justine Triet with Virginie Efira and Adèle Exarchopoulos. The film was presented in competition at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.
The announcement of his death triggered strong reactions from the world of culture to political leaders.
Tuesday shortly before 4 p.m., the actor had been transported by helicopter to the Grenoble University Hospital after colliding with another skier at the crossing of two blue slopes, according to a spokesperson for the station, straddling the border between France and Italy.
According to the gendarmerie, the vital prognosis of the actor was engaged on Tuesday. An investigation was opened and entrusted to the CRS Alpes, the prosecution also indicated.
In the archives of Libé
Revealed at 19 in the Lost by André Téchiné alongside Emmanuelle Béart, his interpretation of a First World War soldier in A long engagement Sunday by Jean-Pierre Jeunet won him the César for best male hope in 2005. Also leading an international career, he will soon be starring in the Marvel series Moon Knight, broadcast on the Disney + platform.
Born on November 25, 1984, Gaspard Ulliel spent his childhood between school and the family apartment, in the center of Paris, where he drew for hours. It is a friend of his mother who offers him to join the agency of actors that she has just created. He is only 11 years old but he quickly gets a small role in a TV movie. After a few summer internships at the Cours Florent, he enrolled after his baccalaureate at the University of Saint-Denis for cinema studies, which he abandoned all the more quickly as his career quickly took off. He was noticed by Michel Blanc who in 2002 offered him a role in the hit comedy Kiss whoever you want.
Updated at 4:48 p.m. with more details about the actor’s career.
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