Queer Places:
Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los
Angeles
Louis Jourdan (born Louis Robert Gendre; 19 June 1921 – 14 February 2015) was a French film and television actor. He was known for his suave roles in several Hollywood films, including Alfred Hitchcock's The Paradine Case (1947), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), Gigi (1958), The Best of Everything (1959), The V.I.P.s (1963) and Octopussy (1983). He played Dracula in the 1977 BBC television production Count Dracula.
Jourdan was born Louis Robert Gendre in Marseille, France, in 1921,[1] one of three sons of Yvonne (née Jourdan) and Henry Gendre, a hotel owner.[2] He was educated in France, Turkey, and the UK, and studied acting at the École Dramatique. While there, he began acting on the professional stage, where he was brought to the attention of director Marc Allégret, who hired him to work as an assistant camera operator on Entrée des Artistes (The Curtain Rises).[3] Allegret then cast Jourdan in what should have been his first movie, Le Corsaire in 1939 opposite Charles Boyer. Filming was interrupted by the Second World War and was never resumed.[4]
Jourdan was too young[dubious – discuss] for army service and was hired by Marcel L'Herbier to appear in La Comédie du bonheur (1940) in Rome. He was making Untel Père et Fils in that city when Italy declared war on France. He returned to France, and appeared in Premier rendez-vous (1941) with Danielle Darrieux, shot in Paris. He spent a year on a work gang.[4] Jourdan was ordered to make German propaganda films, which he refused to do, and fled to join his family in unoccupied France.[4] There he started making movies again, ten films in two years.[4] They included several for Allegret: Parade en sept nuits (1941); L'Arlésienne (1942) with Raimu, The Beautiful Adventure (1942); Les Petites du quai aux fleurs (1944); Twilight (1944). He was in The Heart of a Nation (1943) with Raimu; La Vie de Bohème (1945). His father was arrested by the Gestapo; months later he escaped, and joined the French Resistance, along with his family.[4] "I was given work to do and I did it", said Jourdan later of his time in the resistance. "I worked on illegal leaflets, helping to print and distribute them."[4] After the liberation of France in 1945, he returned to Paris with his childhood sweetheart, Berthe Frédérique (nicknamed "Quique"). They married in 1946.
On 11 March 1946, Jourdan married his childhood sweetheart, Berthe Frédérique. The marriage produced one child, Louis Henry Jourdan, born on 6 October 1951, and lasted until her death in 2014.[27] Louis Henry Jourdan died of a narcotics overdose at the age of 29 on 12 May 1981;[28] his body was buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles.[28] After his retirement from acting in 1992 Jourdan lived in Los Angeles. In July 2010 he was made a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur, an honor that he received accompanied by friends, including Sidney Poitier and Kirk Douglas.[29][30] Jourdan has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6153 and 6445 Hollywood Boulevard.[27]
Jourdan died at his home in Beverly Hills on 14 February 2015 at the age of 93.[27] His body was buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles.
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