THE RELEVANT QUEER: Jean Marais, Celebrated Actor and Cocteau’s Muse, Born December 11, 1913

”I always wanted to be happy, perhaps that’s what pleased Cocteau, who was so anguished.”

TRQ: Jean Marais, Born December 11, 1913

Actor, writer, director and sculptor Jean Marais was born on December 11, 1913 in Cherbourg, France. Awarded the French Legion of Honor for his contribution to cinema, he starred in over 100 films and theatre productions as one of France’s most celebrated stars. Blonde and classically good looking, the box office heartthrob also was the muse and lover of artist and writer Jean Cocteau for nearly 30 years.

Born Jean-Alfred Villain-Marais, he often claimed having a charmed life, despite growing up in poverty. Marais’s mother was mercurial, loving, but also sometimes violent. She was convicted of shoplifting at least once.

As a high school student, Marais was expelled after dressing as a female and flirting with a male teacher. Marais was interested in art and drama, even as a child. Painting and working as a photographer and sketch artist after school, Marais landed his first part in a film after selling artwork to director Marcel L’Herbier. Marais appears in several of L’Herbeir’s films.

At 24, Marais met 48-year-old Cocteau while auditioning for his play, Oedipe-roi, in 1937. Cocteau gave Marais the role and fell in love with him. Marais has commented that his meeting Cocteau was a “second birth.”

Marais’s relationship with Cocteau was personal, romantic, and professional. He convinced Cocteau to write L’Éternel Retour (The Eternal Return), the critically and commercially successful film in which he plays the starring role.

During World War II, even after the Nazis occupied Paris, Marais continued acting in both film and theatre. Cocteau’s friendship with Arno Breker, a sculptor and Nazi protege of Hitler, prevented Marais, Picasso and others from being imprisoned or deported. After Paris’s liberation, Marias joined the Second Armoured Division to drive fuel and ammunition trucks to the front line. France awarded him the Croix de Guerre for his service.

”Perhaps that’s what pleased Cocteau, who was so anguished. I have never known stress. I was a sort of beast, a peasant type. I had no culture. I had never heard of Cocteau. I was given an unbelievable chance.”
— Jean Marais

In 1946, Cocteau directed La Belle et la bête (Beauty and the Beast) which introduced Marais to audiences in America. There, teenage girls, along with gay men who knew of his relationship with the director, embraced him for his attractive looks and physique.

Between 1947 and 1960, Marais starred in another four of Cocteau’s films. These include L’Aigle à deux têtes (The Eagle Has Two Heads, 1947), Les Parents Terribles (The Storm Within, 1948), Orphée (Orpheus, 1949), and Le Testament d’Orphée (The Testament of Orpheus, 1960). He also worked with René Clément, Marc Allégret, Jean Renoir and other legendary directors.

By 1947, Marais’s relationship with Cocteau was less romantic, but their close friendship endured. In 1948 he became involved with George Reich, the American dancer until 1959. In the 1960 Marais adopted a son, Serge Ayala, who later took the name Serge Villain-Marais. His son later became a singer and actor.

Cocteau died in 1963, and shortly after Marais wrote L’Inconcevable Jean Cocteau, a memoir. With his acting career slowing down the 1970s, he spent his time on the French Riviera, painting and sculpting. In 1975 he published Histoires de ma vie, an autobiography. Marais writes candidly about his childhood, his mother’s kleptomania, and his intense relationship with Cocteau.

In 1980, Marais’s life inspired the film The Last Metro by François Truffaut. Marais’s last film role was in Bernardo Bertolucci’s Io ballo da sola (Stealing Beauty, 1996). He said at the time, “For Bertolucci, I would play a shadow on a wall […] He is a true poet of cinema, like Cocteau.”

On November 8, 1998, Marais died from cardiovascular disease in Cannes. He is interred at Vallauris in the Village cemetery. His son, who committed suicide in 2012 after a battle with depression, survived him.

About the Authors:

Troy Wise is currently a PhD student at UAL Central St Martins and teaches fashion and graphic design at London College of Contemporary Arts. His background is in marketing and he is founder and co-editor of Image Amplified. He lives in, and is continually fascinated by, the city of London.

Rick Guzman earned his most recent MA at UAL Central St Martins in Applied Imagination in the Creative Industries. He currently holds two MA’s and an MBA in the New Media, Journalism and International Business fields. Co-editor at Image Amplified since its start, he lives in London, is fascinated by history and is motivated by continuing to learn and explore.

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Sources:

GLBTQ Archive

NY Times

Washington Post

LA Times

Independent