The Dreamlife of Angels

Background:

A natural and photogenic performer with the gamine air of a young Leslie Caron, Elodie Bouchez is one of the young French cinema’s most renowned and prolific actresses. She has made her name by portraying a series of intellectual, often strong-willed young women, characters she permeated with equal parts soul and complexity. A two-time César Award winning actress, Elodie first made impression in a film with her role as platonic Maite in André Téchiné’s 1994 Les Roseaux Sauvages/ The Wild Reeds, in which she picked up her first César Award. Four years later, she bolstered her fame with her widely-acclaimed portrayal of free-spirited itinerant Isa in Erik Zonca’s directorial debut, La via rêvée des anges/ The Dreamlife of Angel. The role brought the actress her next César Award, as well as a Lumiere Award, a Cannes Film Festival Award and a European Film Award. Elodie won a 2001 Cologne Mediterranean Film Festival for her work in Faute à Voltaire, La/ Blame It on Voltaire (2000). However, Elodie is probably best known to American public as the murderer Renée Rienne on the hit show “Alias,” a role she played from 2005 to 2006. She also made a guest appearance in an episode of the Showtime lesbian drama “The L Word” (2006).

Off screen, the French beauty is now a resident of Beverly Hills, California. She is the wife of Thomas Bangalter and has one son with him.


Baby Sitter

Childhood and Family:

In Montreuil-sous-Bois, Seine-Saint-Denis, Île-de-France, France, Élodie Bouchez was born on April 5, 1973. She appeared on stage for the first time at the age of six and became a model when she was thirteen. Elodie studied theater at Lycee St-Thomas d’Aquin in Paris. She also trained as a dancer, something she subsidized with baby-sitting money.

Elodie is married to Thomas Bangalter from band Daft Punk. The couple welcomed their first child, son Tara-Jay, on January 22, 2002. The family currently resides in Beverly Hills, California.


Alias’s Assassin

Career:

French-born Elodie Bouchez knew that she wanted to become an actress at a very young age. A model at age 13, she auditioned for the late Serge Gainsbourg at 16 and two weeks later was working on his drama film Stan the Flasher (1990). This led to a good role, starring as Virginie, in Christine Lipinska’s Le Cahier vole (1993). Her acting career was fading, when in 1994, she landed the starring role of Maïté Alvarez, the nonsexual best buddy of the perceptive gay Francois (played by Gaël Morel), in André Téchiné’s Les Roseaux Sauvages/ The Wild Reeds, a critically acclaimed coming-of-age drama. Delivering an exceptional performance, she took home a 1995 César for Most Promising Actress, an outstanding achievement that vaulted Elodie to the front ranks of French actresses.

After her much-talk-about-performance in Les Roseaux Sauvages, Elodie received countless offers to collaborate with a variety of filmmakers, but early on she showed a fondness for working with young directors. In 1994, the same year she starred in Les Roseaux, the actress acted in the ensemble drama Le Péril Jeune, which was helmed by budding young director Cédric Klapisch. She rejoined Morel a year later in Those Were the Days, and appeared in his directorial debut in 1996’s drama A Toute Vitesse/Full Speed, where she was cast as a university student. She had a small part as a young girl in Ismail Merchant’s The Proprietor (1996) and supported Romane Bohringer and Melvil Poupaud in director Graham Guit’s Le ceil est a nous/ Shooting Stars (1997).

It was not until 1998, however, that Elodie’s career gained further boost. She teamed up with another up and coming director, Erik Zonca, in his directorial debut, La via rêvée des anges/ The Dreamlife of Angels, where she starred as Isa, a prudent, free-spirited young traveling who enters into a turbulent friendship with the wobbly Marie (Natacha Régnier). For her breathtaking performance, Elodie won a Best Actress César and a Lumiere for Best Actress. With her co-star, she also shared a Cannes Film Festival and a European Film in the category of Best Actress.

The same year, the acclaimed performer was reunited with Morel in Laurent Bouhnik’s Zonzon, costarred with Jean-Marc Barr in Didier Le Pecheur’s controversial fact-based J’aimerais pas crever un dimanche, playing a woman thought to be dead from a drug overdose who earnes the attentions of a necrophiliac mortician, and teamed up with Roschdy Zem, Gerald Thomassin and Antoine du Merle in the Canes-screened Louise/Take 2, a love story set among paltry criminals living in rough Paris directed and written by Siegfried. She also rejoined filmmaker Guit for 1998’s Les Kidnappers. In 1999, Elodie acted in her first English-language film, Lovers. The drama also marked actor Jean-Marc Barr’s directorial debut.

In 2000, Elodie was cast opposite Sami Bouajila in Abdel Kechiche’s Faute à Voltaire, La/ Blame It on Voltaire. Brilliantly playing Lucie, she was handed a Cologne Mediterranean Film Festival for Best Actress. This was followed by roles in such movies as The Beat Nicks (2000), Too Much Flesh (2000, with Rosanna Arquette), Roman Coppola’s CQ (2001), Petit poucet, Le/ Tom Thumb (2001), Being Light (2001), Dreams of Trespass (2002), Guerre à Paris, La/ The War in Paris (2002), Stormy Weather (2003, earned a Edda nomination for Best Actress) and Paul Black’s America Brown (2004, opposite Natasha Lyonne).

Elodie costarred in the independent comedy Shooting Vegetarians (2005), played the supporting role of Jeanne in the comedy Brice de Nice (2005) and appeared with Robyn Wright Penn in the American drama Sorry, Haters (2005). In the fall of 2005, the actress found herself joining the cast of the American TV popular series “Alias” for its fifth and final season. She played Renée Rienne, an internationally wanted criminal who had secretly been working with Vaughn (Michael Vartan). While working on the show, she also made a guest appearance in a 2006 episode of Showtime’s lesbian drama “The L Word,” portraying a French writer who encounters Jenny (Mia Kirshner) on a trip to Canada.

The award-winning actress has recently completed a drama feature, Ma place au soleil, which for 2007 release. She also will star in the upcoming Héros (2007), Olivier De Plas’s Teen Spirit (2007), Je déteste les enfants des autres (2007) and Gael Morel’s Après lui (2007).


Awards:

- Cologne Mediterranean Film Festival: Best Actress, Faute à Voltaire, La/ Blame It on Voltaire, 2001
- César: Best Actress (Meilleure actrice), Vie rêvée des anges, La/ The Dreamlife of Angels, 1999
- Lumiere: Best Actress (Meilleure comédienne), Vie rêvée des anges, La/ The Dreamlife of Angels, 1999
- European Film: Best Actress, Vie rêvée des anges, La/ The Dreamlife of Angels, 1998
- Cannes Film Festival: Best Actress, Vie rêvée des anges, La/ The Dreamlife of Angels, 1998
- César: Most Promising Actress (Meilleur espoir féminin), Roseaux sauvages, Les/The Wild Reeds, 1995