François Jean Blanche, known as "Francis Blanche" (20 July 1921 – 6 July 1974) was a French actor, singer, humorist and author. He was a very popular figure on stage, radio and in films, during the 1950s and 1960s. His two daughters, Barbara & Dominique, are artists with their studios in Eze.
François Jean Blanche, known as "Francis Blanche" (20 July 1921 – 6 July 1974) was a French actor, singer, humorist and author. He was a very popular figure on stage, radio and in films, during the 1950s and 1960s. His two daughters, Barbara & Dominique, are artists with their studios in Eze.
Blanche was born in an artistic family, mainly of stage actors—including his father Louis Blanche and his uncle, Emmanuel Blanche, who was a painter—. He completed his secondary schooling at fourteen, the youngest in France to do so at the time.
In the 1940s and 1950s, Blanche was part of Robert Dhéry's theatrical company Les Branquignols, with whom he played in the film Ah! Les belles bacchantes, starring Robert Dhéry, Colette Brosset (Dhéry's then-wife), and Louis de Funès; directed by Jean Loubignac in 1954.
Blanche teamed up with Pierre Dac to form a comic duo best remembered for Le Sâr Rabindranath Duval, a sketch about a phony and nonsensical Indian clairvoyant and guru (1957). They also created a popular and equally nonsensical radiophonic series, loosely based on a highly improbable espionage and conspiration plot, Malheur aux barbus, which was broadcast on Paris Inter in 213 episodes from 1951 to 1952. The same plot and characters were revived on Europe 1 in a series called Signé Furax, enjoying no less than 1,034 daily episodes between 1956 and 1960. Both broadcasts were phenomenal audience successes in the pre-television era. Blanche was also renowned for broadcasting phone pranks, in which he entertained listeners by making the most improbable situations sound plausible.
He wrote poems, and the lyrics of 673 songs. On stage, he acted in Tartuffe and Néron and, in 1955, Chevalier du Ciel, an operetta by Luis Mariano at the Gaîté-Lyrique theatre.
Blanche also enjoyed a successful cinematographic career, both as an actor and scriptwriter. He appeared as a hard-headed German colonel ("Obersturmführer Schulz") opposite Brigitte Bardot in Babette s'en va-t-en guerre (1959). He was one of the favourite actors of French filmmaker Georges Lautner, and played Maître Folace (a shady solicitor counselling a colourful gangster mob) in Les Tontons flingueurs (1963). Blanche also appeared in Boris Vassilief's Les Barbouzes (1964).
He delighted in parodying classical music, adapting famous works such as Schubert's "Die Forelle" (The Trout) into a crazy and slightly risqué piece about a 16-year-old romantic girl obsessed with Schubert's song to the point of giving birth to a live trout while performing it on her piano. Similarly, he turned Beethoven's 5th Symphony into a lengthy and quite repetitive musical glorification of the clothes peg and its fictitious inventor, Jérémie-Victor Opdebec.
Blanche died at the age of 52, from a heart attack with a background of untreated Type 1 diabetes. He is buried in Èze cemetery.
Source: Article "Francis Blanche" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
External links
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/nm0087126
Wikipedia: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q739325
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Filmography (Movies)
Les 100 vies de Francis Blanche
Character:Self (archive footage)
Release Date:19/03/2022
Pierre Dac et Francis Blanche : Le Meilleur du Parti d'en Rire
Character:Lui-même
Release Date:01/12/2020
Comiques de toujours (Vol. 1 à 4)
Character:Self (archive footage)
Release Date:13/10/2009
A Whale That Had a Toothache
Character:Francis
Release Date:15/04/1975
No Pockets in a Shroud
Character:Nathaël Grissom
Release Date:25/10/1974
Say it with Flowers
Character:Gérard Rollain
Release Date:04/09/1974
France, Incorporated
Character:Pierre, the perverted financier
Release Date:04/06/1974
OK Patron
Character:Victor Hutin, Sophie's father
Release Date:01/06/1974
By the Blood of Others
Character:Doctor
Release Date:07/03/1974
La Dernière Bourrée à Paris
Character:Gaston Payrac
Release Date:31/10/1973
The Edifying and Joyous Story of Colinot
Character:Wanderer
Release Date:24/10/1973
Le Solitaire
Character:Norbert
Release Date:24/10/1973
Racconti romani di una ex-novizia
Character:Pietro l'Aretino
Release Date:21/09/1973
I. You. They.
Character:Darbon, le galeriste
Release Date:28/06/1973
I've Had It
Character:Mr. de Chatiez
Release Date:23/02/1973
The Terror with Cross-Eyes
Character:Commissioner Pigna
Release Date:02/09/1972
The Eroticist
Character:padre Scirer
Release Date:16/03/1972
Scandal Man
Character:Paluche
Release Date:14/02/1972
La Grande Maffia
Character:Modeste Miette
Release Date:17/09/1971
Il furto è l'anima del commercio!?...
Character:Sigfrid
Release Date:09/07/1971
Qu'est-ce qui fait courir les crocodiles ?
Character:Hector Grogenol
Release Date:21/05/1971
Les Jambes en l'air
Character:Hugon
Release Date:13/05/1971
Are You Engaged to a Greek Sailor or an Airline Pilot?
Character:Maurice Gombaud
Release Date:15/04/1971
The Great Java
Character:Auguste Kougloff / Augustin Colombani
Release Date:13/01/1971
Alice au pays des merveilles
Character:King of hearts
Release Date:22/12/1970
Ces messieurs de la gâchette
Character:Marco Lombardi
Release Date:08/04/1970
Adieu Berthe
Character:Léo Bertold
Release Date:21/03/1970
The Stud
Character:Tax collector Dupuis
Release Date:13/02/1970
Poussez pas grand-père dans les cactus
Character:Alphonse Ramier / Al Gregor
Release Date:05/11/1969
Un merveilleux parfum d'oseille
Character:Loïc de Kerfuntel
Release Date:14/08/1969
Aux frais de la princesse
Character:Achille
Release Date:04/07/1969
Erotissimo
Character:Le polyvalent
Release Date:07/06/1969
Le bourgeois gentil mec
Character:Spinosa
Release Date:21/05/1969
Les gros malins
Character:Francis Bertolde aka 'Le book'
Release Date:13/05/1969
Faites donc plaisir aux amis
Character:Maximiliano
Release Date:05/02/1969
The Big Wash
Character:Doctor Loupioc
Release Date:12/11/1968
Salut Berthe !
Character:Passerby with the pipe (uncredited)
Release Date:20/08/1968
The Men in the Family
Character:Strumberger
Release Date:08/05/1968
Rita the Field Marshal
Character:Captain Hans Vogel
Release Date:21/12/1967
Du mou dans la gâchette
Character:La Prudence
Release Date:30/08/1967
The Great Gadget
Character:Copec
Release Date:21/06/1967
Belle de Jour
Character:Mr. Adolphe
Release Date:24/05/1967
Le canard en fer blanc
Character:Le docteur Grego
Release Date:22/04/1967
The Oldest Profession
Character:The Doctor (segment "Aujourd'hui")
Release Date:07/04/1967
Deux Romains en Gaule
Character:Le druide inventeur de la potion d'invisibilité
Release Date:25/02/1967
Order of the Daisy
Character:L'inspecteur Maurice Leloup
Release Date:20/01/1967
The Big Grasshopper
Character:Gédéon
Release Date:11/01/1967
Les enquiquineurs
Character:Monsieur Achille Eloy
Release Date:09/11/1966
Les malabars sont au parfum
Character:Ivanov
Release Date:02/02/1966
The Sleeping Sentinel
Character:Constant
Release Date:21/01/1966
Under Your Hat
Character:Mario l'enchanteur
Release Date:03/09/1965
Pas de caviar pour tante Olga
Character:Dufour
Release Date:13/08/1965
The Real Bargain
Character:Paul Souflé
Release Date:09/03/1965
Les baratineurs
Character:Louis Dujardin
Release Date:01/02/1965
Les Gorilles
Character:Félix
Release Date:23/12/1964
The Great Spy Chase
Character:Boris Vassiliev
Release Date:10/12/1964
Chance at Love
Character:Adjutant (segment "Chance du guerrier, La")
Release Date:30/10/1964
The Big Scare
Character:
Release Date:28/10/1964
Les pieds nickelés
Character:Commissaire Lenoir
Release Date:30/09/1964
Male Hunt
Character:Nino Papatakis
Release Date:18/09/1964
Champagne for Savages
Character:Francis
Release Date:26/08/1964
The World's Most Beautiful Swindlers
Character:Mr. Humlaupt (segment "L'Homme qui vendit la tour Eiffel")
Release Date:14/08/1964
Clémentine chérie
Character:Nuisance at the Miss ceremony (uncredited)
Release Date:04/08/1964
Requiem pour un caïd
Character:Émile aka 'le Boxeur'
Release Date:25/07/1964
Jaloux comme un tigre
Character:Chauffeur
Release Date:16/06/1964
Dandelions by the Roots
Character:L'oncle Absalon, le savant farfelu
Release Date:06/05/1964
Actualités télérévisées
Character:Presenter
Release Date:01/04/1964
The Black Tulip
Character:Plantin
Release Date:28/02/1964
Les Gros Bras
Character:Mr. Pédro Andromèze
Release Date:31/12/1963
Crooks in Clover
Character:Maître Folace
Release Date:27/11/1963
Sweet and Sour
Character:Franz
Release Date:04/09/1963
Thank Heaven for Small Favors
Character:Chief Insp. Cucherat
Release Date:28/08/1963
The Virgins
Character:Mr. de Brétevielle
Release Date:22/05/1963
People in Luck
Character:M. Bricheton (segment "Le Repas gastronomique")
Release Date:26/04/1963
The Abominable Man of Customs
Character:Arnakos
Release Date:01/03/1963
Who Stole the Body?
Character:Édouard
Release Date:01/02/1963
Tartarin de Tarascon
Character:Antoine Tartarin
Release Date:22/11/1962
The Hideout
Character:Edouard
Release Date:21/09/1962
Snobs!
Character:Morloch
Release Date:05/09/1962
Accroche-toi, y'a du vent!
Character:Capitano Fornace
Release Date:20/04/1962
The Seventh Juror
Character:Attorney General
Release Date:18/04/1962
The Vendetta
Character:Bartoli
Release Date:17/04/1962
Hitch-Hike
Character:le douanier belge
Release Date:16/03/1962
Operation Gold Ingot
Character:Fellous
Release Date:13/03/1962
Romulus and the Sabines
Character:Mezio
Release Date:15/11/1961
The Girl of a Thousand Months
Character:Commendator Borgioli
Release Date:05/11/1961
House of Sin
Character:Blanchin
Release Date:25/10/1961
Les Livreurs
Character:Félix
Release Date:24/07/1961
Long Live Henry IV... Long Live Love!
Character:Prior
Release Date:04/04/1961
The Bear
Character:Chappuis
Release Date:14/12/1960
Little Girls and High Finance
Character:Bank manager
Release Date:30/10/1960
Le Olimpiadi dei mariti
Character:
Release Date:27/10/1960
We Like It Cold
Character:von Krussendorf
Release Date:20/09/1960
Love and the Frenchwoman
Character:Me Marcerou, avocat et ami du couple (segment "Le Divorce")
Release Date:16/09/1960
Le pillole di Ercole
Character:Augusto
Release Date:10/09/1960
Easy Come Easy Go
Character:Félix
Release Date:26/05/1960
Long Live the Duke!
Character:
Release Date:14/03/1960
Some Like It... Cold
Character:William Foster Valmorin, American
Release Date:17/02/1960
Match contre la mort
Character:Mr. Pascal
Release Date:02/12/1959
The Green Mare
Character:Ferdinand Haudouin
Release Date:29/10/1959
Babette Goes to War
Character:Schulz
Release Date:18/09/1959
Too Late to Love
Character:Camille, le patron du bistrot
Release Date:05/05/1959
The Indestructible
Character:Francis Blanchard
Release Date:29/04/1959
The Motorcycle Cops
Character:His Excellency Curacagua
Release Date:18/03/1959
Toto in Paris
Character:Il maggiordomo (uncredited)
Release Date:23/10/1958
The Little Professor
Character:General overseer
Release Date:26/09/1958
A Dog, A Mouse and a Sputnik
Character:Chazot
Release Date:09/09/1958
Anyone Can Kill Me
Character:La Bonbonne
Release Date:06/12/1957
La Polka des menottes
Character:un voisin
Release Date:04/09/1957
Honoré de Marseille
Character:Pasquale Marchetti
Release Date:12/12/1956
Life is beautiful
Character:un voisin
Release Date:05/10/1956
Peek-a-boo
Character:Garibaldo Trouchet, le ténor / Un musicien
Release Date:15/10/1954
Trust Me!
Character:Nicolas
Release Date:17/05/1954
Midnight... Quai de Bercy
Character:M. Boulay, l'épicier libidineux
Release Date:21/05/1953
Good Enough to Eat
Character:Gilles
Release Date:08/06/1951
Ils ont vingt ans
Character:Michel Barbarin
Release Date:15/12/1950
The Sad Sack
Character:Jean du Bois d'Ombelles
Release Date:10/11/1950
The Killer is Listening
Character:Self
Release Date:01/01/1948
Frédérica
Character:Ami de Gilbert
Release Date:18/11/1942
Television Appearances
Images
