Sylvie Testud

Sylvie Testud
Sylvie Testud in 2011
Born	(1971-01-17) 17 January 1971 Lyon, Rhône, France
Occupation	Actress, director, writer
Years active	1991–present

Sylvie Testud (born 17 January 1971) is a French actress, writer and film director. Her film career began in 1991 and she has since won two César Awards for highly acclaimed performances.

Life and career

She grew up in the La Croix-Rousse quarter of Lyon. This was an area with many Portuguese, Spanish and Italian immigrants. Her mother immigrated from Italy in the 1960s and married a Frenchman who left the family when Sylvie was just two years old.^[1]

In 1985, when she was 14, she saw Charlotte Gainsbourg in her role of the complex young girl in L'Effrontée, a film directed by Claude Miller, identified with Gainsbourg, and so took drama classes in Lyon with the actor and director Christian Taponard. In 1989, she moved to Paris and spent three years at the Conservatoire (CNSAD). In the early and mid 1990s, she landed her first small roles in films like L'Histoire du garcon qui voulait qu'on l'embrasse, directed by Philippe Harel, and Love, etc., directed by Marion Vernoux. In 1997 she had great success in Germany with Caroline Link's Jenseits der Stille for which she learned German, sign language, and the clarinet. In 1998 she had her first major role in French cinema playing Béa in Thomas Vincent's Karnaval. In 2000 she starred in Chantal Akerman's La Captive, an adaptation of La Prisonièrre, the fifth part of Marcel Proust's A La Recherche du Temps Perdu. In 2001 she won the César Award for Most Promising Actress for her portrayal of Christine Papin, one of the Papin sisters, in Les Blessures assassines (English title: Murderous Maids), The story concerned a young servant woman found guilty of the murder, with her sister's help, of her employer's wife and daughter; it had made sensational headlines in France in 1933.

In 2003, she published the autobiographical book Il n'y a pas beaucoup d'etoiles ce soir, with anecdotes of her day-to-day life as an actress. The French edition featured a cover designed by her sister Ghislaine.

One of her most noted performances was as the star of the film Stupeur et tremblements, adapted from the novel by Amélie Nothomb, for which she was awarded a César and a Lumières Award for Best Actress in 2004. She plays a woman struggling with the difference in culture between the Japanese business world and the western, Belgian world, from which she comes. In 2005 or 2006 she returned to her native Lyon (to the Théâtre de la Croix Rousse), where she played the rôle of Edith in Philippe Faure's adaptation of Stefan Zweig's La Pitié dangereuse. She starred in 2007's two-time Academy Award-winning film La Vie en Rose, as Momone, Edith Piaf's best friend. In the 2008 film Sagan, she portrayed the writer Françoise Sagan, earning unanimous praise for her hauntingly accurate portrayal and for which she was again nominated for the César for best actress.

She was made Chevalier (Knight) of the Ordre national du Mérite in March 2009.^[2]

She has a son, Ruben, born on 15 February 2005, and a daughter Esther, born in January 2011.^[3]

In 2012, she participated in Rendez-vous en terre inconnue.

Filmography

Actress

Testud at the César Awards 2008.

Director

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sylvie Testud.

• Sylvie Testud at the Internet Movie Database
• Sylvie Testud at AlloCiné (French)
• Sylvie Testud at Actricesdefrance.org
• CSOJ - Alain Badiou Sylvie Testud appears on French television's program Ce Soir (En direct, channel 3) in conversation with militant philosopher Alain Badiou. The topic of this episode is "Faut-il réinventer l'amour?". Ms. Testud appears 46:18 minutes into the program and is in conversation with Badiou and the program host for about 24 minutes (no commercials, this show is in French).

Awards for Sylvie Testud César Award for Best Actress 1976 Romy Schneider 1977 Annie Girardot 1978 Simone Signoret 1979 Romy Schneider 1980 Miou-Miou 1981 Catherine Deneuve 1982 Isabelle Adjani 1983 Nathalie Baye 1984 Isabelle Adjani 1985 Sabine Azéma 1986 Sandrine Bonnaire 1987 Sabine Azéma 1988 Anémone 1989 Isabelle Adjani 1990 Carole Bouquet 1991 Anne Parillaud 1992 Jeanne Moreau 1993 Catherine Deneuve 1994 Juliette Binoche 1995 Isabelle Adjani 1996 Isabelle Huppert 1997 Fanny Ardant 1998 Ariane Ascaride 1999 Élodie Bouchez 2000 Karin Viard 2001 Dominique Blanc 2002 Emmanuelle Devos 2003 Isabelle Carré 2004 Sylvie Testud 2005 Yolande Moreau 2006 Nathalie Baye 2007 Marina Hands 2008 Marion Cotillard 2009 Yolande Moreau 2010 Isabelle Adjani 2011 Sara Forestier 2012 Bérénice Bejo 2013 Emmanuelle Riva 2014 Sandrine Kiberlain 2015 Adèle Haenel César Award for Most Promising Actress 1983 Sophie Marceau 1984 Sandrine Bonnaire 1985 Laure Marsac 1986 Charlotte Gainsbourg 1987 Catherine Mouchet 1988 Mathilda May 1989 Catherine Jacob 1990 Vanessa Paradis 1991 Judith Henry 1992 Géraldine Pailhas 1993 Romane Bohringer 1994 Valeria Bruni Tedeschi 1995 Élodie Bouchez 1996 Sandrine Kiberlain 1997 Laurence Côte 1998 Emma de Caunes 1999 Natacha Régnier 2000 Audrey Tautou 2001 Sylvie Testud 2002 Rachida Brakni 2003 Cécile de France 2004 Julie Depardieu 2005 Sara Forestier 2006 Linh Dan Pham 2007 Mélanie Laurent 2008 Hafsia Herzi 2009 Déborah François 2010 Mélanie Thierry 2011 Leïla Bekhti 2012 Neyda Yadri / Clotilde Hesme 2013 Izïa Higelin 2014 Adèle Exarchopoulos 2015 Louane Emera European Film Award for Best Actress Carmen Maura (1988) Ruth Sheen (1989) Carmen Maura (1990) Clotilde Courau (1991) Juliette Binoche (1992) Maia Morgenstern (1993) Emily Watson (1996) Juliette Binoche (1997) Élodie Bouchez and Natacha Régnier (1998) Cecilia Roth (1999) Björk (2000) Isabelle Huppert (2001) Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Emmanuelle Béart, Fanny Ardant, Virginie Ledoyen, Danielle Darrieux, Ludivine Sagnier and Firmine Richard (2002) Charlotte Rampling (2003) Imelda Staunton (2004) Julia Jentsch (2005) Penélope Cruz (2006) Helen Mirren (2007) Kristin Scott Thomas (2008) Kate Winslet (2009) Sylvie Testud (2010) Tilda Swinton (2011) Emmanuelle Riva (2012) Veerle Baetens (2013) Marion Cotillard (2014) Lumières Award for Best Actress 1996–2009 Isabelle Huppert (1996) Fanny Ardant (1997) Miou-Miou (1998) Élodie Bouchez (1999) Karin Viard (2000) Isabelle Huppert (2001) Audrey Tautou (2002) Isabelle Carré (2003) Sylvie Testud (2004) Emmanuelle Devos (2005) Isabelle Huppert (2006) Marina Hands (2007) Marion Cotillard (2008) Yolande Moreau (2009) 2010–2019 Isabelle Adjani (2010) Kristin Scott Thomas (2011) Bérénice Bejo (2012) Emmanuelle Riva (2013) Léa Seydoux (2014) Karin Viard (2015)