Marcel Pagnol

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Template:Short description Template:Redirect Template:Infobox writer Template:French literature sidebar Marcel Paul Pagnol (Template:IPAc-en, also Template:IPAc-en Template:Respell;<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Template:IPA; 28 February 1895 – 18 April 1974) was a French novelist, playwright, and filmmaker. Regarded as an auteur,<ref name="OscherwitzHiggins2009">Template:Cite book</ref> in 1946, he became the first filmmaker elected to the Template:Lang. Pagnol is generally regarded as one of France's greatest 20th-century writers and is notable for the fact that he excelled in almost every medium—memoir, novel, drama and film.

Early life

Pagnol was born on 28 February 1895 in Aubagne, Bouches-du-Rhône department, in southern France near Marseille, the eldest son of schoolteacher Joseph PagnolTemplate:Ref and seamstress Augustine Lansot.Template:Ref<ref name = "CastansChrono">Castans (1987), pp. 363–368</ref> He was secretly baptised at the Église Saint-Charles in Marseilles.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Marcel Pagnol grew up in Marseille with his younger brothers Paul and René, and younger sister Germaine.

School years

In July 1904, the family rented the Bastide Neuve,<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> – a house in the sleepy Provençal village of La Treille – for the summer holidays, the first of many spent in the hilly countryside between Aubagne and Marseille.<ref>Castans (1987), p. 22.</ref> About the same time, Augustine's health, which had never been robust, began to noticeably decline and on 16 June 1910 she succumbed to a chest infection ("mal de poitrine") and died, aged 36.<ref>Castans (1987), pp. 27, 32.</ref> Joseph remarried in 1912.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/>

In 1913, at the age of 18, Marcel passed his baccalaureate in philosophy<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> and started studying literature at the university in Aix-en-Provence. When World War I broke out, he was called up into the infantry at Nice but in January 1915 he was discharged because of his poor constitution ("faiblesse de constitution'').<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> On 2 March 1916, he married Simone Colin in Marseille and in November graduated in English.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> He became an English teacher, teaching in various local colleges and at a lycée in Marseille.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/>

Career

Time in Paris

In 1922, he moved to Paris, where he taught English until 1927,<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> when he decided instead to devote his life to playwriting.<ref name="501MD">Template:Cite book</ref> During this time, he belonged to a group of young writers, in collaboration with one of whom, Paul Nivoix, he wrote the play, Merchants of Glory, which was produced in 1924. This was followed, in 1928, by Topaze, a satire based on ambition.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> Exiled in Paris, he returned nostalgically to his Provençal roots, taking this as his setting for his play Marius, which later became the first of his works to be adapted into a film in 1931.<ref name="501MD" />

Separated from Simone Collin since 1926 (though not divorced until 1941), he formed a relationship with the young English dancer Kitty Murphy. Their son Jacques Pagnol was born on 24 September 1930.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> (Jacques later became his father's assistant and subsequently a cameraman for France 3 Marseille.)

Filmmaking career

In 1929, on a visit to London, Pagnol attended a screening of one of the first talking films and he was so impressed that he decided to devote his efforts to cinema.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> He contacted Paramount Picture studios and suggested adapting his play Marius for cinema. The film was directed by Alexander Korda and released on 10 October 1931.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> It became one of the first successful French-language talking films.

In 1932, Pagnol founded his own film production studios in the countryside near Marseille.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> Over the next decade Pagnol produced his own films, taking many different roles in the production – financier, director, script writer, studio head, and foreign-language script translator – and employing the greatest French actors of the period, also owning film laboratories and several movie theaters in Marseille. Pagnol built a production system that was nearly unique as it allowed him to control all the aspects of his film's production, including distribution.<ref name="dvdclassik">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> His business came to a near-complete end during World War II as both the Nazi occupiers and the Vichy administration wanted to get hold of his film studio's equipment. Pagnol pretexted that his company was failing in order to sell it to Gaumont, and even destroyed the copies of his latest project, La Prière aux étoiles, so the German-controlled Continental Films could not get hold of it. He only kept one theater in Marseille. After the war, Pagnol created a new production company and rebuilt his filmmaking activity.<ref name="dvdclassik"/> On 4 April 1946, Pagnol was elected to the Template:Lang, taking his seat in March 1947, the first filmmaker to receive this honour.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/>

Themes of Pagnol's films

In his films, Pagnol transfers his playwriting talents onto the big screen. His editing style is somberly reserved, placing emphasis on the content of an image. As a pictorial naturalist, Pagnol relies on film as art to convey a deeper meaning rather than solely as a tool to tell a story. Pagnol also took great care in the type of actors he employed, hiring local actors to appear in his films to highlight their unique accents and culture. Like his plays, Pagnol's films emphasize dialogue and musicality. The themes of many of Pagnol's films revolve around the acute observation of social rituals. Using interchangeable symbols and recurring character roles, such as proud fathers and rebellious children, Pagnol illuminates the provincial life of the lower class. Notably, Pagnol also frequently compares women and land, showing both can be barren or fertile. Above all, Pagnol uses all this to illustrate the importance of human bonds and their renewal.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

As a novelist

In 1945, Pagnol remarried to actress Jacqueline Bouvier, later known as Jacqueline Pagnol.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> They had two children together, Frédéric (born 1946) and Estelle (born 1951).<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> Estelle died at the age of two from encephalitis. Pagnol was so devastated that he fled the south and returned to live in Paris. He went back to writing plays, but after his next piece was badly received he decided to change his job once more and began writing a series of autobiographical novels – Souvenirs d'enfance – based on his childhood experiences.

In 1957, the first two novels in the series, La Gloire de mon père and Le château de ma mère were published to instant acclaim.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> The third Le Temps des secrets was published in 1959,<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> the fourth Le Temps des Amours was to remain unfinished and was not published until 1977, after his death. In the meantime, Pagnol turned to a second series, L'Eau des Collines – Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources – which focused on the machinations of Provençal peasant life at the beginning of the twentieth century and were published in 1962.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> L'Eau des collines was itself based on the film Manon des Sources, which Pagnol had directed in 1952 with his wife Jacqueline in the title role.

Later life

Pagnol appeared before a review committee of the Parisian Comite Regional Interprofessionnel d'Epuration on 27 November 1946 for three charges of collaboration. His charges were for adding Philippe Pétain's armistice speech into The Well-Digger's Daughter, allowing La France en Marche, a Vichy propaganda film series, to be processed at his laboratories in Marseille, and distributing a propaganda short about the attack on Mers-el-Kébir. Pagnol defended himself as the Germans banned The Well-Digger's Daughter in 1941 and only unbanned it after the Pétain scene was removed and that the Vichy government seized his studios, personnel, and distribution services. All charges against him were dismissed on 3 February 1947.Template:Sfn By that time, Pagnol had restarted his filmmaking career with Naïs.

Pagnol's second marriage, with actress Jacqueline Pagnol, brought newfound happiness in his private life.<ref name="La Provence">Template:Cite web</ref> In 1952, he gave Jacqueline the title role of Manon of the Spring, a two-part, 4-hour long film that he had written especially for her.<ref name="Première1">Template:Cite magazine</ref> In 1954, the death their daughter Estelle was a tragedy from which he never quite recovered; he stopped making film afterwards.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Jacqueline's support helped him write his successful books during the following years.<ref name="La Provence"/>

Pagnol died in Paris on 18 April 1974.<ref name = "CastansChrono"/> He is buried in Marseille at the cemetery La Treille, along with his mother, father, brothers, and wife. His boyhood friend, David Magnan (Lili des Bellons in the autobiographies), who died at the Second Battle of the Marne in July 1918, is buried nearby.

Translations

Pagnol was also known for his translations of Shakespeare (from English) and Virgil (from Latin):

  • 1944 : Le Songe d'une nuit d'été (A Midsummer Night's Dream) by William Shakespeare, first presented in 1947, at the Grand Théâtre de Monaco; Paris, Œuvres complètes, Club de l'Honnête Homme, 1971
  • 1947 : Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Paris, Nagel
  • 1958 : Bucoliques (The Eclogues) by Virgil, Paris, Grasset

Pagnol's Hamlet is still performed in France, although some have criticized his portrayal of Hamlet as somewhat effeminate.<ref>Maurois, André. Pagnol et Shakespeare, Opéra, 1948</ref>

Film adaptations

In 1986, the two volumes of The Water of the Hills were adapted by filmmaker Claude Berri into the two films Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources .

In 1990, La Gloire de mon père and Le château de ma mère, Pagnol's affectionate reminiscences of childhood, were filmed by Yves Robert.

In 2000, Jacques Nahum produced Marius, Fanny, and César for French television.

In 2011, La Fille du puisatier was remade by Daniel Auteuil.

In 2013, Marius and Fanny were remade, also by Daniel Auteuil.

In 2022, Le Temps Des Secrets was adapted and filmed by Christophe Barratier.

Awards

  • 1939: Best foreign film for Harvest - New York Film Critics Circle Awards
  • 1940: Best foreign film for The Baker's Wife - New York Film Critics Circle Awards
  • 1950: Best foreign film for Jofroi - New York Film Critics Circle Awards

Tribute

On 28 February 2020 Google celebrated his 125th birthday with a Google Doodle.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Filmography

Bibliography

See also

Notes

References

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Works cited

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