Nathalie Baye

Daughter of bohemian painters, Nathalie Baye, a dyslexic child, abandoned her studies at the age of 14 to join a dance school in Monaco. At 17, she left for New York to complete her training in Russian ballets. But on her return, she turned to the theater, and entered Cours Simon then the Conservatory. In 1972, when Faustine and the Beautiful Summer marked her first film appearance, she made a decisive meeting, that of François Truffaut, who offered her the role of the script in The American Night. Proof of the confidence placed in her by the master of the New Wave, she lends her voice to the enigmatic switchboard operator of The Man Who Loved Women and, above all, gives the reply to the filmmaker in one of his most personal films, La Green Room (1978).

Nathalie Baye worked very early on with two other great directors: Pialat (La Gueule ouvert, 1974) and Godard. This one directs her in Sauve qui peut la vie, which earned her the César for Best Supporting Actor in 1981, a reward that she won the following year for A strange affair. In addition to the votes of moviegoers, there are those of the general public, who identifies with this discreet actress with a charming smile, playing the teachers at Tavernier (Une Semaine de vacances, 1980) and the Provincials at Goretta. With the poster of two successes of 1982, The Return of Martin Guerre and The Balance, it obtains, for its composition of prostitute in the film of Bob Swaim, the César of the Best actress in 1983. If the melody I married a shadow establishes her star status, she doesn't

Less present on the screens from the end of the 80s, Baye found in 1990 one of her most beautiful roles, that of a divorced mother who lost her footing, in Nicole Garcia's first film, One Weekend in Two. In 1999, a pivotal year, she found the favor of the spectators by camping one of the beauticians of the very popular Venus beauty by Tonie Marshall and won the Interpretation Prize in Venice for Une Liaison Pornographique. Once again a prominent actress, she is chosen by Spielberg to play DiCaprio's mother in Catch Me If You Can (2002). Long subscribed to the roles of reasonable woman, the actress no longer hesitates to give free rein to her fantasy (It will go better tomorrow, One remains, the other leaves). Unscrupulous politician for Chabrol (La Fleur du mal), Nathalie Baye, much sought after by the filmmakers of the young generation, on the contrary embodies vulnerable women for Noémie Lvovsky (Les Sentiments), Thierry Klifa (Une vie à toi) or even Xavier Beauvois (Le Petit lieutenant, 2005). In 2008, she reunited with Josiane Balasko, seven years after Absolutely fabulous, who this time directed her in Cliente.

Fleeing from the difficulties of her life in Ensemble c'est trop (2009) with Pierre Arditi, she rediscovers their fantasies and joys in True Lies by Pierre Salvadori, again alongside Audrey Tautou. For the sixth time in a film with Gérard Depardieu in Small World (2010), the actress is also asked by the young film prodigy, Xavier Dolan, who offers her the role of the mother of a man wanting to change sex, in Laurence Anyways.

The actress then continues to juggle genres brilliantly; we see it in the thriller The SK1 Affair, returning to the hunt for serial killer Guy Georges. She then returns to the side of comedy with The Queens of the Ring and Lou! Tiny newspaper. Nathalie then made a detour to the thriller with La Volante in 2015 before shining in the dramas Préjudice and Moka alongside Emmanuelle Devos. The actress turns again under the direction of Xavier Dolan in 2016 with Juste la fin du monde. She plays there the exuberant mother of Gaspar Ulliel, Vincent Cassel and Léa Seydoux. The following year, the artist played for the first time with his daughter Laura Smet in the Dix pour Cent series.

The two women are then reunited for the first time in the cinema by Xavier Beauvois in Les Gardiennes, a historical drama set in 1915.