Maurice Ronet makes elegant men look uncomfortable with themselves. We value the restraint in his voice and gaze, though the melancholy can become familiar and a more dominant star can draw attention away from him.
Fi1m perspective
In Purple Noon (1960), Maurice Ronet has to hold our attention while Alain Delon keeps drawing it back to Ripley. His Philippe Greenleaf is rich and louche, but René Clément's tense thriller gives us little chance to consider him without wondering what Ripley makes of him. We felt uneasy watching it, because that constant checking made it difficult to settle into the other performances. Ronet and Marie Laforêt, as Marge Duval, have to work within that narrow attention.
Ronet's restraint deserves the closer look the thriller cannot always give him. His voice and gaze suggest detachment without making a man seem empty, and he can show vulnerability without an elaborate display of suffering. We value that restraint, although the repeated casting as melancholy playboys can make it too easy to know what to expect.
After early romantic leads, the important turn was Louis Malle's Elevator to the Gallows (1958), with Ronet as Julien Tavernier opposite Jeanne Moreau. Malle worked with him again on The Fire Within (1963), placing him at the centre as Alain Leroy. The part suits his ability to suggest a man's unhappiness without spelling it out. Malle is the director to turn to for Ronet carrying a film rather than competing for our attention.
Claude Chabrol used him as the cynical seducer Victor Pegala in The Unfaithful Wife (1969). That same year, Jacques Deray cast him as Harry, Delon's rival in The Swimming Pool (1969). Both parts suit his ability to make a man's motives uncertain without overstatement. The danger is that we recognise the dissatisfied dandy before we notice the individual character.
His filmography is uneven enough that following it indiscriminately is a poor way to get to know him. Start with Purple Noon: it is a fine thriller even when Ronet is not its chief attraction. For a longer look at what he can do, make The Fire Within the next film.
Biography
Maurice Ronet was a French actor, director and writer. Born Maurice Julien Marie Robinet in Nice on 13 April 1927, he was the only child of stage actors Émile Robinet and Gilberte Dubreuil. He made his stage debut at the age of 14 alongside his parents in Sacha Guitry's Deux couverts in Lausanne. He trained at the Centre du Spectacle de la Rue-Blanche and entered the Paris Conservatoire in 1944, where Jean-Louis Barrault was among his mentors.
Ronet made his film debut in Jacques Becker's Rendez-vous de juillet (1949). He appeared in more than one hundred films, including Elevator to the Gallows (1958) as Julien Tavernier, Purple Noon (1960) as Philippe Greenleaf, The Fire Within (1963) as Alain Leroy, The Swimming Pool (1969) as Harry, The Unfaithful Wife (1969) as Victor Pegala and Beau Pere (1981) as Charly. He was married to actress Maria Pacôme from 1950 to 1956. Ronet died in Paris on 14 March 1983.
