With a career spanning four decades, he worked with some of the best directors of his generation, including the New Wave pioneers Francois Truffaut, Louis Malle and Jean-Luc Godard.
The son of a French colonel, Brialy was born in Algeria and discovered cinema during his military service when he worked in an army film unit.
After walk-on parts in a string of hit movies including Truffaut's 1959 classic The 400 Blows and Malle's Frantic in 1957, fame arrived in 1958 with lead roles in two Claude Chabrol films, Le Beau Serge and The Cousins.
The success kickstarted his marathon career as an actor, including as the lead in Jean-Luc Godard's 1961 classic A Woman is a Woman, and then director, with a dozen works to his name since the 1971 Eglantine.
A household name in French film whose close friends included the late actress Romy Schneider, Brialy had owned a popular Paris theater, Les Bouffes du Nord since 1986 and was a regular guest on radio and television.
RSS