Irène Jacob
The film and stage actress Irène Jacob became internationally famous with her portrayal of the title role in Krzysztof Kieślowski’s film La double vie de Véronique. She won the Best Actress award at the 1991 International Cannes Film Festival for her performance.
Her film debut in Au revoir, les enfants (1987) marked the start of an international career in which she has worked with directors including Michelangelo Antonioni, Wim Wenders, Theo Angelopoulos, Agnieszka Holland, Paul Auster, Jonathan Nossiter and Hugh Hudson. In France she has performed under the direction of Nadine Trintignant, Claude Lelouch, Serge Le Péron, Pascal Thomas, Riad Sattouf and Jacques Deray.
In 1994 she played the main female role, alongside Jean-Louis Trintignant, in Kieślowski’s last film, Trois couleurs: Rouge. More recently she has appeared in the US series The Affair and The OA.
Irène Jacob has also appeared in numerous theatre productions, at venues such as the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, the Théâtre de l’Atelier and the Théâtre national de Chaillot in Paris, and in London’s West End. She has worked with stage directors including Irina Brook, Patrice Leconte, Richard Nelson, Jérôme Kircher, Philippe Calvario, Jean-François Peyret, David Lescot, Oriza Hirata, Roland Auzet and Katie Mitchell. In 2019 she performed in Thomas Ostermeier’s French-language adaptation of Returning to Reims at Paris’s Théâtre de la Ville. In 2021 she starred in Amos Gitai’s production of Yitzhak Rabin: Chronicle of an Assassination at the Théâtre du Châtelet and London’s Coronet Theatre.
As a reciter for music theatre works, she has appeared at venues including the Opéra Comique and the Salle Pleyel in Paris, the Opéra National de Lyon, the Teatro Massimo in Palermo, at London’s Royal Albert Hall and at New York’s Lincoln Center. She has performed speaking roles in pieces such as Stravinsky’s Perséphone, Honegger’s Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher, Poulenc’s L’Histoire de Babar, Debussy’s La Boîte à joujoux, Les Chansons de Bilitis and Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien and Bizet’s L’Arlésienne.
She has recorded several chansons for CD with the musician Vincent Delerm, and made two pop albums for the labels Naïve and Universal Music France with her brother Francis Jacob.
In 2019 she published her debut novel Big Bang. In 2020 she was named President of the Institut Lumière. She will soon be appearing in an English-French series on Apple TV+ and in Alice Vial’s television series Septième ciel.