Tony-winning stage and screen star Liliane Montevecchi has died at the age of 85.
Born in Paris in 1932, Montevecchi began her career in ballet, becoming a prima ballerina in Roland Petit’s Ballets de Paris.
After spending much of the 1950s in film and television sharing the screen with such stars such as Fred Astaire, Leslie Caron, Jerry Lewis and Marlon Brando.
Liliane Montevecchi the glamorous French star of stage and screen who won a Tony for Nine has died at the age of 85. Here, pictured in the 1950s when she would have been in her 20s
Broadway director Tommy Tune and Liliane Montevecchi circa 1982 in New York City
The Paris-born former prima ballerina was an MGM contract player in the 1950s but found more enduring fame three decades later on Broadway
She landed small roles in The Glass Slipper with Michael Wilding, Daddy Long Legs with Fred Astaire, Moonfleet with Stewart Granger, The Sad Sack with Jerry Lewis, King Creole with Elvis Presley and The Young Lions, with Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift and Dean Martin.
MGM signed her to a seven-year contract, but American movies largely wasted her according to the New York Times.
Montevecchi’s Broadway debut came in 1958 in the musical revue La Plume de Ma Tante.
She followed that with a starring role in the Folies Bergere — first in Las Vegas, then in a touring company, as well in Paris – touring with the company for 10 years.
She knew Gene Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor and Clark Gable, and she took classes at The Actors Studio in New York, alongside Marilyn Monroe.
Her career peak came when she won a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical in 1982 for Liliane La Fleur in the musical, Nine.
Elvis Presley and Liliane Montevecchi, left, Roland Petit and Montevecchi in the ballet La Croqueuse de diamants right
: Liliane Montevecchi poses backstage with the Moulin Rouge dancers in Paris in 2014
Under the direction of Tommy Tune, Montevecchi won a best featured actress Tony for her role of a producer whose showstopping number is called Folies Bergere.
Eight years later she received a Tony-nomination for her performance as Elizaveta Grushinskaya in Grand Hotel reports BroadwayWorld.
On TV she guest-starred in more than 20 shows. Liliane Montevecchi also appeared in the films Wall Street and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days with Matthew McConaughey.
Montevecchi was a regular on cabaret stages in New York and internationally right up until last year, touring in semi-autobiographical shows.
In 2013 she was honored by the French Minister of Culture as an Officer of Arts and Culture to France and the world at large.
Montevecchi is survived by her companion of 30 years, Italian actor, Claudio Saponi reports The Hollywood Reporter.
A private burial will be in held in Paris, followed by a memorial service in New York that will be announced.
In 2013 she was honored by the French Minister of Culture as an Officer of Arts and Culture to France and the world at large