Marcel Pagnol.

Marcel Pagnol was a French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, and director. He began as a teacher at Lycee Condorcet in Paris in 1922. The success of his first two plays let him start his own film production and distribution company near Marseilles. In 1931, he founded the cinema magazine Les Cahiers du Film. His comedic depiction of provincial life in the South of France, with witty dialogue and local custom, became his trademark. Many of his actors were established stars of the theatre. His most significant achievement is the Marius trilogy Marius, Fanny, and Cesar, filmed between 1931 and 1936.

He was the first filmmaker to be elected to the French Academy, serving from 1946 until his death in 1974.

A biography of Pagnol appears in John Wakeman’s World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945, pages 865-870 New York: H.W. Wilson, 1987.

He fathered three children out of wedlock: Jacques b. 1932 with Kitty Murphy; Jean-Pierre b. 1933 with Orane Demazis; and Francine b. 1935 with Yvonne Pouperon. His children with his wife Jacqueline Bouvier Pagnol were Frédéric 1946 and Estelle 1951.

Pagnol was pictured on a EUR2.00 Monaco commemorative postage stamp issued 28 February 2020.

He served as president of the jury at the Cannes Film Festival in 1955 and as a jury member in 1957 and 1966.

Pagnol adapted his own film Manon des Sources, with his wife Jacqueline in the title role, into two novels, Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources, collectively titled L’Eau des Collines.

He was a friend from high school with writer Albert Cohen.

Though his work is less fashionable now, Pagnol remains one of France’s greatest 20th-century writers. He excelled in memoir, novel, drama, and film.

He was a French novelist, playwright, and filmmaker.