French actress Marina Vlady, Cannes winner and star of more than 80 films, dies at 88

Portrait taken on January 14, 1970 shows French-Russian actress Marina Vlady during the premiere of ‘Subject for a Short Story’ a 1969 Soviet-French drama film directed by Sergei Yutkevich. Actress Marina Vlady died on September 24, 2026 at the age of 88, her family told AFP. — AFP pic

First Published: Friday, 25 Sep 2026 1:12 PM MYT

PARIS, Sept 25 — French actress Marina Vlady, who appeared in more than 80 films and picked up a prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1963, died yesterday at the age of 88, her family told AFP.

She died “at home, surrounded by her loved ones and her animals”, her children said in a statement, in which they praised “a long and beautiful life, well lived”.

Vlady worked with some of the greats of cinema, including French new wave director Jean-Luc Godard and Hollywood legend Orson Welles.

She won the best actress prize at Cannes in 1963 for her role in The Conjugal Bed — for which she also won a Golden Globe.

In 1965 took a rare English-speaking role in Welles’s Shakespearean drama Chimes at Midnight.

The daughter of a former dancer and a former French army aviator who also sang at the opera, Vlady also found success in music with two albums recorded with her sisters. — AFP

Actress Marina Vlady attends the photocall of the movie ‘Spira Mirabilis’ presented in competition at the 73rd Venice Film Festival on September 4, 2016 at Venice Lido. — AFP pic