Montand, Yves Ivo Livi

Montand, Yves Ivo Livi (1921-1991), French singer and actor, also known for his political activities. He was born in Monsummano, Italy, to a modest family with communist links, who fled fascism and settled in Marseille. Montand left school when he was 11, and worked in a variety of menial jobs before taking up singing in 1938. After the war he was again employed as a singer in the south of France, before achieving wider success in Parisian theatres. He met Edith Piaf at the Moulin-Rouge, and she was instrumental in bringing him to the attention of audiences; from then on he led a double career as a singer and an actor, while never neglecting his political commitments. He met the German-born actress Simone Signoret, and they married in 1951. Together they signed the “Stockholm Appeal” for the banning of the atomic bomb. His first important film was Le Salaire de la Peur (1953; The Wages of Fear), directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot. At the end of the 1950s, disillusioned with the Communist party, he was drawn to the United States, where George Cukor engaged him to star in Let’s Make Love (1960) with Marilyn Monroe, with whom he had a brief affair. As an actor, however, he was more at ease in political films, such as Z (1968) and L’Aveu (1970; The Confession) directed by Constantin Costa-Gavras. As a singer, he is best remembered for such songs as “Les Feuilles Mortes” and “A Bicyclette”. His ambition to become a politician failed in the 1980s, although two films made at this time, Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources (both 1986), were his last major successes as an actor.