Roger Vadim Biography

MARITAL STATUS
Professions Director , Screenwriter , Actor more
Birth name Roger Plemiannikov
Nationality French
Birth January 26, 1928
Death February 11, 2000
BIOGRAPHY
Director, screenwriter, producer, actor, but also a great seducer… Roger Vadim will be remembered as a filmmaker who loved to cast the women in his life. Married five times, to some of the most beautiful women and actresses of the moment (Brigitte Bardot, Jane Fonda…), his personal and professional journey will always be closely linked, from his first feature film with Brigitte Bardot, to his last TV film with Marie -Christine Barrault .

Real name Roger Vladimir Plemiannikov, Roger Vadim was born in 1928 to a diplomat father of Russian origin and a mother from Provence. He spent his childhood abroad, notably in Egypt and Turkey, until the death of his father in 1938. Thinking of becoming a diplomat like his father (he studied at the Institute of Political Studies), Roger Vadim finally turned to theater (he took classes at the Sarah Bernhardt Theater and played small roles, for example in “The Maker” or “King Lear”) and cinema (he played in Futures Vedettes by Daniel Gélin ( 1952 ) , or Les Dents longes by Marc Allégret (1955)).

It was thanks to Marc Allégret, for whom he was also an assistant director and screenwriter ( Maria Chapdelaine , L’Amante di Paride , En effeuillant la marguerite ), that he met Brigitte Bardot. Real love at first sight, he wants to marry her, but also to give her a leading role in the cinema! Still a minor, Brigitte Bardot waited until she was 18, in 1952, to become the filmmaker’s wife.

Roger Vadim made his first feature film as a director in 1956, starring Brigitte Bardot! With And God… created woman , Vadim creates the BB myth! The film, showing a liberated young woman, caused a scandal and made Brigitte Bardot an international star. Roger Vadim’s directorial career is launched. He then turns You Never Know? with Françoise Arnoul and Robert Hossein in 1957, then reunited with Brigitte Bardot for Les jewelers du clair de lune in 1958 (he directed the actress five times throughout his career: La Bride sur le cou (1961), Le Repos du warrior (1962) and Don Juan or if Don Juan were a woman… (1972)).

The filmmaker hit the headlines again with Les Liaisons Dangereuses 1960 , with Gérard Philipe and Jeanne Moreau in the title roles. It’s on the set of this new adaptation of the novel by Choderlos De Laclosthat he met his future wife, the Danish actress Annette Stroyberg, now Annette Vadim . He again directed his second wife in the fantasy film And Die for Pleasure , an adaptation of a short story by Sheridan Le Fanu ; then divorced the same year.

A fan of adaptations of all kinds, Roger Vadim brings to the big screen A Castle in Sweden ( Françoise Sagan ‘s first play ) or even the work of the Marquis de Sade with Vice and Virtue . The filming of “Vice and Virtue” will be the scene of his meeting with Catherine Deneuve , with whom he will have a relationship and will give birth to his second child, Christian Vadim , who became an actor.

The director continues his series of adaptations with a new muse and wife: Jane Fonda . She appeared in La Ronde in 1963 and played in La Curé in 1965, and in one of the sketches of the sketch film Histoires extraordinaires in 1968, without forgetting Barbarella , the same year! “Barbarella” is a science fiction character that has become cult, invented by Jean-Claude Forest, in the eponymous comic strip. Vadim thus offers one of Jane Fonda’s most famous roles, as he did for Bardot in his time!

In the 70s and 80s, Roger Vadim crossed the Atlantic to direct several films in English: Rock Hudson and Telly Savalas starred in If you believe girl , Vadim’s first foray into the United States. Followed by Jeux erotic de nuit in 1980, or even The Hot touch in 1982. He continued to tour in France at the same time: Brigitte Bardot became a female Don Juan under his direction (“Don Juan or if Don Juan were a woman…” , 1972), while Sylvia Kristel , revealed in Emmanuelle in 1974, is for him A Faithful Woman (1976). In 1983, he filmed the youth of Surprise Party (where he directed his own son, Christian Vadim ) and ended his career in cinema in 1988 with an American remake freely inspired by his most famous film, And God Created Woman . Rebecca De Mornay and Frank Langella are in the cast of this “self-remake”, which will not meet with the hoped-for success.

From the 90s, Roger Vadim devoted himself to writing, theater, and filming for the small screen. Marie-Christine Barrault, his last wife, would regularly play roles in his TV films ( Amour fou , Mon père suis raison , Un Coup de baguette magic …) or soap operas (“La Nouvelle tribe”, 1996). Suffering from cancer, Roger Vadim died on February 11, 2000 in Paris.