Maria Schneider (actress)
Maria-Hélène Schneider, known professionally as Maria Schneider, was a French actress. In 1972, at the age of 19, she starred opposite Marlon Brando in Last Tango in Paris, but being traumatised by being raped in a scene and hounded by unsavoury publicity negatively affected her subsequent career. Although Michelangelo Antonioni's The Passenger (1975) showcased her abilities, a reputation for walking out of films mid-production resulted in her becoming unwelcome in the industry. However, she re-established stability in her personal and professional life in the early 1980s, and became an advocate for equality and improving the conditions actresses worked under. She continued acting in film and TV until a few years before she died in 2011 after a long illness.
Schneider at the Festival Créteil Films de Femmes in 2001
Film recordings A woman like Eva, 1978
Image: Filmopnamen Een vrouw als Eva Velserbeek, 1978 14
Last Tango in Paris is a 1972 erotic drama film directed by Bernardo Bertolucci. The film stars Marlon Brando, Maria Schneider and Jean-Pierre Léaud, and portrays a recently widowed American who begins an anonymous sexual relationship with a young Parisian woman.
Theatrical release poster
The Pont de Bir-Hakeim in Paris, where numerous scenes were shot
Double Portrait of Lucian Freud and Frank Auerbach (left side, oil on canvas, 1964)
Study for a Portrait of Isabel Rawsthorne (oil on canvas, 1964)