The actress Mylène Demongeot, made famous by her role in Les Sorcières de Salem, died at the age of 87, Thursday, December 1 in the early afternoon, in a Parisian hospital, after a seventy-year-long career and as many films, announced her press agent, confirming the information revealed by journalist Henry-Jean Servat on his Twitter account.
In recent years, Mylène Demongeot had returned to acting by participating in popular comedies such as the Camping saga by Fabien Onteniente. Her final feature film is Thomas Gilou's Maison de retraite, released last February, and in which she played opposite Kev Adams and Gérard Depardieu.
Marie-Hélène (her real first name), native of Nice, made a name for herself in the 1950s by playing in the adaptation of the Sorcières de Salem alongside Yves Montand and Simone Signoret, after a first role in Les Enfants de l’amour (1950). Originally a model, she was compared in her debut as an actress to Brigitte Bardot, with whom she shared the same love of animals and the environment, and of whom she was presented as a rival.
She was next seen in Bonjour tristesse (1958) by Otto Preminger, based on the novel by Françoise Sagan, then in the Fantômas trilogy, in the 1960s, or even Les Trois Mousquetaires by Bernard Borderie. More recently, she starred in 36 Quai des Orfèvres (2004) by Olivier Marchal, which earned her a nomination for the 2005 Césars. During her long career, Mylène Demongeot toured with Jean Marais, Roger Moore, Henri Vidal, Jeffrey Hunter, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Michel Piccoli, Gérard Depardieu, Louis de Funès, Francis Blanche, Curd Jürgens, David Niven, Dirk Bogarde, and Sami Frey, among others. In 1980, she produced Signé Furax by Marc Simenon, whom she married in 1968.
Between September 2013 and June 2014, she was also a member of Grosses Têtes by Philippe Bouvard, on RTL.