Until my heart is beating

“Writing about my life took me more than a year, during which I have always been switching from laughter to tears. Am I proud of the result? I am proud of achieving it… For the rest, I just listened to what my heart was telling me.”

From La Grande Sauterelle by Georges Lautner, to Week-end by Jean-Luc Godard and Le Grand Blond avec une chaussure noire by Yves Robert, who has never heard of Mireille Darc?

But, beyond this prestigious public image, what do we know about her, what do we know about this generous and wilful woman who had chosen, for a long time, not to tell a word about her joys and her personal fights?

Mireille Darc was born in Toulon on May 15th 1938, the third child of a most humble family. When she is fourteen, she decides to go to the Toulon Conservatory to learn how to act. When she is twenty, she goes to Paris, for she intends to become a member of the Comédie Française. But, very quickly, she is spotted by Claude Barma to play in La Grande Bretèche. She chooses then to be a film actress.

In 1968, she meets Alain Delon, that she intimately pictures as a tender and sweet man… Their love affair lasted for fifteen years.

In 1980, she has an open-heart operation by Professor Christian Cabrol who saves her from an announced death. Such a painful experience leads her to write a documentary film. She switches thus from acting to directing, choosing subjects such as organ transplants, prostitution, prisons for women…

Eight years after the tragic death of journalist and writer Pierre Barret, her second love, Mireille Darc meets in 1996 with Pascal Desprez, an architect. They are married now.