ANNA KARINA

(22 September 1940 - 14 December 2019)

Before she became an actress, the Danish-born Anna Karina, who has died from cancer at the age of 79, had studied dance and painting and also became a successful model in Paris for Coco Chanel and Pierre Cardin. Then director Jean-Luc Godard met her and offered her a cameo in his first feature film, Breathless (A bout de souffle) in 1960. But she refused to appear naked in the film and lost the role. However, ironically enough, she was in another Godard feature, Une femme est une femme, playing a striptease artist. Then she appeared as an actress in a silent movie section of Agnès Varda’s Cleo de cinq à sept, along with Godard. She became a muse for Godard and also his wife from 1961 until 1967 when they divorced. They were part of the French 'Nouvelle Vague', the New Wave in French cinema and she was directed again by Godard in Vivre sa vie, Le petit soldat, Bande à part, Alphaville, Made in USA, Pierrot le foux and a section of The Oldest Profession. Karina also worked extensively with other French and Italian directors including Jacques Rivette, Jacques Baratier, Roger Vadim, Jean Aurel, Maurice Ronet, Valerio Zurlini, Visconti, Fassbinder, Pierre Granier-Deferre, Volker Schlṏndorff, Andrḗ Delvaux and Dennis Berry whom she later married. She appeared in a number of English-speaking films including She’ll Have to Go (1962) with Bob Monkhouse and Hattie Jacques, The Magus with Anthony Quinn and Michael Caine, Before Winter Comes with David Niven and Topol, Laughter in the Dark with Nicol Williamson, Justine with Dirk Bogarde, The Salzburg Connection with Barry Newman, an international version of Treasure Island with Vic Tayback, Martin Landau, Jean-Pierre Lḗaud and Melvil Poupaud, and The Truth About Charlie with Mark Wahlberg, Thandie Newton and Tim Robbins, as well as Agnès Varda and Charles Aznavour. She directed herself in both Living Together and her last film, Victoria, which she shot in 2008. Along the way she had made TV appearances including an episode of the BBC’s Z Cars and the US TV series I Spy. Serge Gainsbourg wrote a musical for her in 1967 called simply Anna. Her birth name was Hanne Karen Blarke Bayer. After divorcing Godard, she married actor-director Pierre Fabre, then actor-director-writer Daniel Duval and finally Dennis Berry from 1982 until her death.

MICHAEL DARVELL