Grace Kelly, an actress and princess at Cannes

News
published on 24.01.2014

The screening of Olivier Dahan’s “Grace of Monaco” as the opening film at the 67th Festival de Cannes is also a tribute, in the guise of Nicole Kidman, to the film career of Grace Kelly. After just a few films, critics began to rank Alfred Hitchcock’s among the acting greats. First unveiled by John Ford in 1953 in Mogambo, she was invited to the Festival de Cannes for the first time in 1955, following her role in George Seaton’s The Country Girl, for which she won that year’s Oscar for Best Actress. It was on that occasion that she met Prince Rainier de Monaco on the Festival fringes an encounter that would change her life. A look back at the appearances of the actress and princess at Cannes.

► 1955

The Country Girl by George Seaton was selected in Competition. Grace Kelly played the starring female role and made her first appearance at Cannes, accompanied by Jean-Pierre Aumont.

Jean-Pierre AUMONT, Grace KELLY © PELE COLL/STILLS/GAMMA

►► 1972

Frenzy, Alfred Hitchcock’s penultimate film, was presented Out of Competition. The director’s favoured actress in his three previous films (Dial M for Murder, Rear Window and To Catch a Thief), Grace Kelly, now the Princess of Monaco, joined her mentor on the red carpet.

Grace Kelly, Alfred Hitchcock © AFP

►►► 1977

The Children of Theatre Street, a documentary on Kirof’s dance school by Robert Dornhelm, is selected Out of Competition. The film is narrated by Princess Grace of Monaco.

►►►► 1980

The Festival honours the memory of Alfred Hitchcock, who died on 29th April in Los Angeles. Princess Grace of Monaco joined in the tributes to the man who said of women that they were “like suspense itself, the more they excite the imagination, the more emotions they arouse.”