Suzy Delair

Suzy Delair was a French actress and singer whose cheeky and sexy persona made her a prototype of the French lady on screen. Henri-Georges Clouzot discovered her and gave her two memorable parts: Mila Malou, Inspector Wens's unbearable girlfriend, in The Last One of the Six (1941), written by Clouzot, and in The Murderer Lives at Number 21 (1942), a film Clouzot wrote and directed. In Quai des Orfèvres (1947) she played Jenny Lamour, a frivolous music-hall performer ready to do anything for fame, driving her character's husband into jealous fury. Later films included Jean Grémillon's Pattes blanches (1949), René Clément's Gervaise (1956), and Luchino Visconti's Rocco and His Brothers (1960), though her role in the last was small. Delair was also an excellent singer and delightful in operettas, and she moved between music and film, a division that may have kept her from taking more major roles. Mila Malou and Jenny Lamour took their place in French film heritage.