French song & variety

Alain Delon

The actor is well known, the singer less so. Alain Delon (1935-2024), one of the most famous faces of French cinema, “Purple Noon”, “Rocco and His Brothers”, “The Leopard”, “Le Samouraï”, also lent his voice to records now and then, from the hit “Paroles… paroles…” with Dalida to the cult cover of The Smiths. On the Riviera, he rented a flat in Territet, at La Margeride, with his companion of the time, the actress Mireille Darc, and frequented the café of the Théâtre de l’Alcazar.

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Alain Delon, the actor who sometimes rhymed with music

An actor in Territet

The Vaud Riviera long drew the stars of cinema: Charlie Chaplin at Corsier, Audrey Hepburn nearby and, for the span of a love story, Alain Delon in Territet. With the actress Mireille Darc, his companion for fifteen years, he rented a flat at La Margeride, a 1970s building with a sculpted façade.

Here the couple led the life of locals more than of stars: they might be seen at the café of the Théâtre de l’Alcazar, by the road. Mireille Darc was also among the guests at the inauguration of the rebuilt Casino de Montreux in 1975, alongside Charlie Chaplin and the actor Eddie Constantine.

Delon, Switzerland and Lake Geneva

Territet was only one stage of a long companionship with Switzerland. Like Audrey Hepburn, withdrawn to her house “La Paisible” near Morges, Delon sought there the haven of discretion the country offered stars weary of their own legend. His taste for the region is said to date back to trips to Crans-Montana in the 1960s with Lino Ventura. In 1978, aged forty-three, he settled near Geneva, at Chêne-Bougeries and then Champel, and would later obtain Swiss nationality.

The lake also gave him one of his finest late roles: “Nouvelle Vague”, shot in 1990 at a property near Nyon under the direction of Jean-Luc Godard, a film-maker who lived and died at Rolle, on the other shore of Lake Geneva. Delon kept a fond memory of it, which he recalled again on the film-maker’s death (Paris Match).

“Paroles… paroles…” and the world of variety

For the wider public, Alain Delon and music means first of all “Paroles… paroles…”, Dalida’s 1973 hit over which the actor lays his voice. He plays the smooth talker, murmuring his compliments while the singer mocks their well-worn tricks. According to the legend reported by “Paris Match”, he is said to have polished his turn at the microphone by repeating “How beautiful you are” like a mantra, until Dalida burst out laughing.

Delon would return to variety several times: a kitsch duet with the diva Shirley Bassey, “Thought I’d ring you” (1983); “Comme au cinéma” (1987), to music by Romano Musumarra, where he talks about himself between washes of saxophone; or, more touching, Michel Legrand’s “The Windmills of Your Mind”, sung live on television amid a table that included Jane Birkin, Johnny Hallyday and Serge Gainsbourg.

Dalida and Alain Delon, “Paroles… paroles…” (1973).

“Laetitia”, the François de Roubaix gem

Delon’s finest musical success is also the least known: “Laetitia”, a song written in 1966 for the soundtrack of Robert Enrico’s film “Les Aventuriers”, in which he plays one of the leads. His voice rings surprisingly true, carried by the music of the composer François de Roubaix.

De Roubaix, long revered by a circle of music lovers and cinephiles, passed into posterity when Robbie Williams built his hit “Supreme” on a sample of his score for “Dernier domicile connu” (1970). The musician died in 1975 in a diving accident off the Canary Islands. On a photo of the recording session, Delon dedicated to him this quip: “A pity you have talent, otherwise you would have had success.”

Alain Delon sings “Laetitia”, music by François de Roubaix for “Les Aventuriers” (1966).

A pop icon: The Smiths and Madonna

Delon’s face left its mark on pop far beyond his own records. In 1986, the British band The Smiths chose for the cover of their album “The Queen Is Dead” an image of the actor, eyes closed, taken from the film “L’Insoumis” (1964). “Libération” recalls that Delon had given his consent, asking only, in vain, to change the title, his parents little relishing the sight of him on a record called “The Queen Is Dead”. A good sport, he then posed on the cover of the magazine “Top 50” wearing the T-shirt of that sleeve.

A fan of the actor, Madonna dedicated a track to him in 2012 on her album “MDNA”, “Beautiful Killer”, which nodded to “Le Samouraï” and closed, in essence, on the idea that one could be a beautiful killer yet never match Alain Delon. In 2015 the star admitted he had been her teenage crush: “He is so charismatic.”