Mr. Michael Edward Lonsdale-Crouch (24 May 1931 – 21 September 2020)
Michael Lonsdale, a versatile veteran of French cinema who was known abroad for his villains and antiheroes, including the sad-eyed and subtly psychotic Hugo Drax in the James Bond film “Moonraker” (1979) and the mysterious intelligence broker in Steven Spielberg’s “Munich,” (2005) died on Monday at his home in Paris.Â
It was Orson Welles who first cast Lonsdale as a priest, in The Trial (1962).
Over his long career, Mr. Lonsdale appeared in nearly 200 films, including Fred Zinnemann’s “Day of the Jackal” (1973), James Ivory’s “The Remains of the Day” (1993), Marguerite Duras’s “India Song” (1975) & Détruire Dit-Elle (Destroy, She Said, 1969), François Truffaut’s “La Mariée Etait en Noir” (The Bride Wore Black) 1968, Jean-Pierre Mocky’s “Snobs” (1962), Louis Malle’s “Le Souffle au Coeur” (Murmurs of the Heart, 1971, Jacques Rivette’s “Out 1″ (1974), Alain Resnais’ “Stavisky” (1974), Luis Buñuel’s “Le Fantôme de la Liberté” (The Phantom of Liberty, 1974), Jean-Jacques Annaud’s “The Name of the Rose” (1986), Miloš Forman’s “Goya’s Ghosts” (2006), Nicolas Klotz’s “Heartbeat Detector” (2007), “Agora” (2009), directed by Alejandro Amenábar, Ismaël Ferroukhi’s “Free Men” (2011), and the title role of Manoel de Oliveira’s “O Gebo e a Sombra” (Gebo and the Shadow, 2012)...
Although the quantity of films he made was not reduced, the quality was.
He won a CĂ©sar for his role in Des Hommes et Des Dieux (Of Gods and Men, 2010)Â
Farewell to “The Secret Agent of Cinematic Modernity”
Andy Gotts Photography
