A star of the 7th art has passed away. Austrian-born actor Helmut Berger, a star of the big screen in the 1960s and 1970s who passed away in posterity thanks to his roles in the films of Italian director Luchino Visconti, died Thursday May 18 in Salzburg, according to the website of his agent. He was 78 years old.
Helmut Berger was born in Bad Ischl (Austria) on May 29, 1944. Twenty years later, he worked as an extra on productions in Rome before being spotted by Visconti, whose lover he became and who gave him his first role in 1966. He plays key characters in The Damned (1969), Ludwig or the Twilight of the Gods (1973) – in which he plays a tormented Ludwig II of Bavaria, alongside Romy Schneider replaying the character of Sissi – and Violence and passion (1974). He also appeared in The Godfather III (1990) by Francis Ford Coppola. He was seen more recently in Bertrand Bonello’s Saint Laurent in which he plays the elderly couturier, while Gaspard Ulliel plays Saint Laurent young.
“La dolce vita throughout his life”
Accustomed to aristocratic characters in front of his mentor’s camera, Helmut Berger also shot under the direction of Vittorio de Sica in Le jardin des Finzi-Contini (1970). He had a long romantic relationship with Visconti until the latter’s death in 1976. His career then slowed down and it was in the people pages that he was most noticed.
Drugs, suicide attempts, rowdy liaisons and scandals of all kinds punctuate a large part of his life. He related it all in 1998 in Memoirs, soberly titled Me, with chapters such as In the same bed as Mick and Bianca Jagger or I served Fellini. The opportunity also to rekindle an old but tenacious enmity with Alain Delon, another favorite actor of Visconti.
After a series of health problems, Helmut Berger announces that he will end his career in November 2019. “He has implemented his motto, ‘la dolce vita’, throughout his life”, commented his agent. And to quote the actor who said several years ago: “I have lived three lives in four languages, I have no regrets. »
