Tears for the death of Annie Girardot

We're used to scenes of television presenters fluffing their lines or unable to hold back a fit of the giggles for one reason or another.

But it's surely unusual to see one so visibly moved that they're close to tears.

That's exactly what happened during Tuesday morning's edition of the Canal + breakfast programme "La Matinale".

The show's presenter, Maïtena Biraben, had difficulty controlling her emotions, as did fellow journalist Léon Mercadet.

And the reason was quite simple; their reaction to a short montage paying tribute to one of France's most enduring and acclaimed actresses, Annie Girardot, who died on Monday at the age of 79.

Annie Giradot - acceptance speech during Césars in 1996 (screenshot from YouTube video)

Annie Girardot may not be a name with which many people outside of France are that familiar - especially if you're not a lover of this country's cinema.

But she was a giant of the French film industry during the 1960s and 70s, and had a career that began as an accomplished theatre actress, spanned five decades and included more than 120 films for the big screen and over 50 for television.

Girardot starred in six films directed by Claude Lelouch who compared her to Edith Piaf, saying she was the stage "equivalent" of the French singing legend.

Her long career saw her win three Césars - the French equivalent of the Oscars.

In 1977 she picked up the best actress award for the title role in Jean-Louis Bertucelli's "Docteur Françoise Gailland".

And Girardot twice won best supporting actress; in 1996 for the part of Madame Thénardier in Claude Lelouch's "Les Misérables" and again in 2002 when she played Isabelle Huppert's mother in Michael Haneke's "La Pianiste" (Die Klavierspielerin).

Her acceptance speech at the 1996 awards was a "declaration of love" for the French film industry from which she had been sidelined for several years, and it was one that couldn't fail to touch the hearts of those in the audience and viewers at home.

"I don't know if the French cinema missed me," she said.

"But I missed the French cinema...so much."



In 2006 Girardot went public with the news that she was suffering from Alzheimer's and became something of a symbol of the illness here in France especially after the screening in 2008 of Nicolas Baulieu's "Ainsi va la vie".

It was a documentary which managed to bring home the full force of Alzheimer's while remaining a mostly dignified, tender, loving homage to the star.

Baulieu followed the actress and her family until filming stopped in February 2007 when he said that Girardot was no longer aware of the presence of the cameras.

Among the many, many tributes that have been paid to Girardot since the news of her death was announced is that of France's minister of culture, Frédéric Mitterrand.

"She lit the stage as she lit life: with a humanity and a dramatic depth that touched everyone," he wrote.

"Her death is a painful moment for French cinema, which has lost one of its biggest stars, but also for the public, with whom she had a long and affectionate relationship."

Little wonder perhaps then, that both Biraben and Mercadet had trouble holding back their tears on Tuesday morning - and they probably weren't alone.