While several hundred admirers are expected to honor the memory of the actor, a sound broadcast of the ceremony is planned in the church square.
Anaphylactic shock
A major actor in comedic cinema in the 1980s before moving towards dramatic roles and a career as a director, Michel Blanc suffered a heart attack during the night from Thursday to Friday after a routine examination, and was transported to a Paris hospital where he died.
The Paris prosecutor’s office said it was not aware of his death.
According to his entourage, the actor was the victim of anaphylactic shock, a rare but violent allergic reaction to a food, a drug or venom, which can lead to death in a few minutes. In the case of Michel Blanc, it was a medication that caused the brutal allergic reaction.
“Immense pain”
The death of the eternal Jean-Claude Dusse, this character as exasperating as he is touching who for a time confined Michel Blanc in the roles of hypochondriac or clumsy, has sparked a shower of tributes.
The first of the Splendid troupe to leave, his former comrades Christian Clavier, Gérard Jugnot, Josiane Balasko, Thierry Lhermitte, Marie-Anne Chazel and Bruno Moynot expressed “with one voice” their “immense pain”. All seven of them posed again in April for the weekly Paris Match, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the troupe which was formed at the high school.
Upon the announcement of his death, Head of State Emmanuel Macron spoke of the loss of a “monument of French cinema”, while Prime Minister Michel Barnier estimated that “we all (had) a little bit of Michel Blanc in us.”
Success of Les Bronzés and dramatic roles
Director of the public success “Marche à l’ombre” (1984), Michel Blanc distinguished himself in dramatic films such as “Monsieur Hire” (1989), based on Simenon, and “Les Témoins” (2007) by André Téchiné by playing a homosexual doctor suffering from AIDS.
Despite the great public success of “Bronzés 3” in 2006, he modestly admits that it is not what he “did best”.
Nominated four times for the César for best actor, in 2012 he won the precious statuette for his supporting role as chief of staff in the political thriller “The Exercise of the State”.
