During his acting career that dates back to the 1960’s, Gerard Depardieu has portrayed Cyrano de Bergerac, Danton, Honore de Balzac, Stalin, Rodin and Columbus. But the movie I remember him best for is a 1990 English-language comedy Green Card in which he tries to marry co-star Andie MacDowell to keep from getting deported from the U.S. Big and with a big nose, Depardieu’s character is imposing, assertive, a little funny, a little crude and yet somehow charming. It is how I pictured Depardieu off-screen. Well, I was mostly right but you have to get rid of the charming bit. Ick might be more appropriate.

Depardieu has made more than 250 movies. He’s still at it though it’s hard to remember the last film he was in that mattered. He’s been named best actor at Cannes. He has won a couple Cesar Awards, a Golden Globe and been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor.

But then there’s this: “… the circus of his private life veered from drunk driving offences to no-shows at high-profile film premieres, controversial friendships, and one particularly notorious episode missing the bottle he was trying to urinate in on a plane.” (Gerard Depardieu: France’s Global Star Who Fell From Grace.)

The peeing in a bottle incident occurred on a CityJet flight to Dublin. Flight attendants wouldn’t let him get up to go to the bathroom so he grabbed an empty water bottle instead. Some accounts say he peed in the bottle then spilled some on the floor. Others suggested a complete misfire.

He has made any number of head-scratching, life-changing decisions about his nationality, his religion and where to live. The Guardian reported: “Depardieu has renewed his assault on everything from common decency to the country of his birth. In 2012, following a vocal spat with the French government (at one point he described France as a ‘filthy mess’) over a proposed higher tax rate, he moved to Belgium. In 2013, he was granted Russian citizenship, and declared kinship with Vladimir Putin, writing, ‘We could have both become hoodlums. I think he immediately liked my hooligan side.’”

That didn’t go over well in the Ukraine, nor did his comments supporting Putin’s takeover of Crimea. Dasha Gluschenko, spokeswoman for Ukrainian ministry of Culture told ABC News: “Yes, he is a threat to national security due to his imprudent comments on Ukraine’s integrity and close relations with Kremlin and with the Russian president, in particular.” He was blacklisted in the Ukraine, his movies barred from TV and theaters.

But…but…but.  Then he wrote an Instagram post criticizing the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and got this response: “State Duma Representative Sultan Khamzaev has threatened to confiscate the actor’s properties in Saransk and Grozny and give them to orphans.” (Gerard Depardieu Bids Adieu.)

And the erratic behavior just keeps coming:

– In 1967, Depardieu converted to Islam. That lasted two years. According to a story in the Moscow Times, he has also converted to Buddhism and Hinduism. Then in 2020 he “continued his religious journey” by converting to Orthodox Christianity.

– In a 2017 interview with a reporter from the Daily Beast, Depardieu descended into conspiracy theory mode. “Depardieu was musing on whether the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s might have been the result of U.S. government research into biological weaponry, involving monkeys.”

– In 2018, Newsweek reported a sighting of Depardieu in North Korea during which he announced that he planned to move to Turkey. He is quoted as saying  “I will visit Turkey in October and talk to Erdogan.” 

– Just last year, the Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah identified Depardieu’s next move: “Globally famous former French actor Gerard Depardieu, who became a Russian citizen in 2013, announced his wish to spend more time in Istanbul and Dubai rather than his country. From now on, Depardieu will be staying on a fishing boat converted into a yacht.”

All that is quirky and eccentric and unpredictable. But there’s worse. In 2018, Depardieu was accused of twice raping actress Charlotte Arnoud, the daughter of one of his supposed friends. Five years later, that case is still winding its way through the French legal system.

Then in April of this year, the Guardian published this report. (Gerard Depardieu: 13 women accuse actor of sexually inappropriate behaviour in new report.)

“A new investigation has alleged multiple incidents of sexually inappropriate behaviour by the actor Gérard Depardieu. French investigative website Mediapart published on Wednesday the results of a months-long examination of Depardieu’s on-set actions over an almost-20 year period, ending last year.

“The report, which features testimony from 13 women, alleges multiple incidences of obscene comments, groping and inappropriate acts by Depardieu on high-profile TV and film sets, including Netflix series Marseille, period biopic Dumas and the comedy Big House.

“The actor’s alleged behaviour appears to have largely involved the unwanted touching and groping of young female actors, makeup artists and set technicians, as well as obscene comments and ‘persistent groaning noises’.”

Ugh! That’s more than just a little crude.

-0-

Whatever Happened To?

Grace Slick

Lenny Dykstra

Sly Stone

Gerard Depardieu

Eldridge Cleaver

Mr T

Bill ‘Spaceman’ Lee

Elian Gonzalez

Lorena Bobbitt

Dave Clark

Jennifer Capriati