Marc allegret andre gide biography
Nobel-prize-winning author, social justice crusader, anti-colonialist, adventure traveler, musician, and one-time Communist: André Gide was a larger-than-life character who dominated French letters from the turn of the 20th century to his death in 1951.
Directed by Marc Allégret, with whom Gide traveled extensively in French Equatorial Africa, the recently restored WITH ANDRÉ GIDE was made in the year leading up to the writer’s death. Allégret begins by tracing Gide’s childhood and youth —the trauma of his father’s early death, the effects of his moralistic mother on his psyche, and the simultaneous development of his harsh, puritanical outlook with his growing infatuation with his cousin (and later wife), Madeleine Rondeaux.
Gide’s puritanism eventually fell away, particularly during his African voyages. Using footage from his film TRAVELS IN THE CONGO, Allégret shows Gide’s humanistic side: his appreciation for the Africans he meets, and his determination to fight against their exploitation by colonial powers.
What truly makes WITH ANDRÉ GIDE stand out though, is the intimacy of Gide’s unguarded conversations—many in his home—with friends including some of the literary greats of the day. He discusses the nature of juries, the interpretation of piano solos (with a slightly baffled young pianist), and the early days of the magazine La nouvelle revue française. And Allégret captures some delightful moments of Gide with his grandchildren.
A highly personal portrait, WITH ANDRÉ GIDE presents a little-seen side of this literary and intellectual giant—a man driven by constant curiosity, and devotion to detail. As the film’s narration says, “The faculty of attention characterized Gide in every moment of his life. An attention that was applied to all things human.”
“André Gide lives! A film of overwhelming intensity.”—André Bazin, Le Parisien, February 1952
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Marc Allégret was a French director and photographer, born on December 23, 1900, in Basel and died on November 3, 1973, in Paris.
In addition to film directing, he had a passion for discovering new talent. With an expert eye, he helped start the careers of future stars including Brigitte Bardot, Simone Simon, and Jeanne Moreau.
From the age of seventeen, Marc Allégret was fascinated by the writer André Gide, who became his lover for a decade. Thanks to Gide, Allégret met the artists and writers of France, such as Paul Valéry, Picasso, Man Ray, Jean Cocteau, Erik Satie, and later Saint-Exupéry.
Gide and Allégret went to the Congo together, with Allégret as Gide's official "secretary". He took advantage of this to develop his talents as a photographer and filmmaker. In 1928, Marc Allégret's first film was released: the famous Voyage au Congo (produced by Pierre Braunberger), which remains an exceptional document on Africa at that time.
From 1930, Marc Allégret, helped by his friend the producer Pierre Braunberger, became a great director. In 1932, he directed Marcel Pagnol's Fanny, with the scriptwriter Françoise Giroud at his side. His films were essentially based on a charming romanticism to the glory of youth and from 1930 to 1960, he directed two or even three feature films a year.
Icarus Films is proud to distribute five films by Marc Allégret. Discover more of our featured filmmakers.
“One of Allégret’s greatest strengths – and one of his most lasting contributions to film history – was his unerring instinct for how to best showcase performers via meticulous framing and lighting.”—Filmmaker Magazine
Marc Allegrét papers
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Collection
Call Number: GEN MSS 651
Scope and Contents
The Marc Allégret papers feature material relating to films shot or directed by Allégret and to his association with André Gide. Allégret's working files include screenplays, shooting scripts, correspondence, background and research materials, production notes and documents, cut film, photographs, and printed ephemera dating from his earliest cinematic effort, the documentary Voyage au Congo (1927), to his last feature-length film, Le bal du comte d'Orgel (1970). Allégret became acquainted with Gide through his father's friendship and his travels with Gide into Africa in the mid 1920s are richly documented in the production files, which include correspondence, manuscript notes, photographs, and ephemera, for Voyage au Congo. Other materials relating more or less directly to Gide include the production files for the late documentary Avec André Gide (1952), corrected drafts and proofs for several titles by Gide from the 1920s, and third-party correspondence. Works by Others also include screenplays and shooting scripts by some of Allégret's collaborators. General correspondence consists of letters to Marc Allégret from Françoise Giroud, Roger Martin du Gard, and Roger Vadim, with over seventy pieces of correspondence from Martin du Gard. Third Party correspondence features approximately thirty pieces of correspondence between Marc Allégret's father, Elie Allégret, and André Gide, and include letters from Gide's wife Madeleine, Roger Martin du Gard, and producer Pierre Braunberger. Chiefly in French, with some materials in German and English.
Dates
- 1900 - 1972
- Majority of material found within 1920 - 1956
Creator
Language of Materials
Chiefly in French, with some materials in German and English.
Conditions Governing Access
The materials are open for research.
Cut film contained in boxes 2-3 and 10 is restricted and ma
Marc Allégret
French screenwriter and film director (1900–1973)
Marc Allégret (22 December 1900 – 3 November 1973) was a French screenwriter, photographer and film director.
Biography
Born in Basel, Basel-Stadt, Switzerland, he was the elder brother of Yves Allégret. Marc was educated to be a lawyer in Paris, but while accompanying his lover André Gide on a trip in 1927 to the Congo in Africa, he recorded the trip on film, after which he chose to pursue a career in the motion picture industry. He is credited with helping develop the careers of Simone Simon, Michèle Morgan, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Danièle Delorme, Odette Joyeux, Jeanne Moreau, Brigitte Bardot, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Raimu, Gérard Philipe, Louis Jourdan, and Roger Vadim.
Allégret collaborated on the famous DadaMarcel Duchamp short film Anemic Cinema in 1926 and served as an assistant director to Robert Florey and Augusto Genina. In 1931 he directed his first feature film, Mam’zelle Nitouche. He received acclaim for his subsequent film Fanny and went on to a long career during which he wrote numerous scripts and directed more than fifty films.
Allégret died in 1973 and was interred in the Cimetière des Gonards in Versailles, France.