Belgian actor Émilie Dequenne dies at 43, report says

Emilie Dequenne appears at the awards ceremony during the 76th international film festival, Cannes, southern France on May 27, 2023. (Photo by Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP)

Émilie Dequenne, the Belgian actor who won a top Cannes Film Festival prize for her breakout role in “Rosetta,” has died, a news report says. She was 43.

Her family and agent told the news agency Agence France-Presse that Dequenne died Sunday of a rare cancer in a hospital outside of Paris. In 2023, Dequenne revealed she had been diagnosed with adrenocortical carcinoma. Representatives for Dequenne did not immediately respond to inquires from The Associated Press on Monday.

Dequenne was only 18 when she was selected as best actress at Cannes in 1999. In “Rosetta,” from Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, she portrayed a teenager trying to escape her difficult life in a caravan park with an alcoholic mother. The film also won the Palme d’Or that year.

Born in Belœil, Belgium, in 1981, Dequenne had a performance streak from a young age. She studied drama at the Académie de Musique de Baudour.

She became well-known in France after starring alongside Catherine Deneuve in “The Girl on the Train,” in 2009, based on the true story of a woman who falsely claimed she was the victim of an antisemitic attack. Dequenne also portrayed police officer Laurence Renauld on the French series “The Missing.”

In 2012, she won the Un Certain Regard actress prize from Cannes for “Our Children,” a dark psychological drama inspired by the real story of a Belgian woman who killed her five children. She was also nominated for several César Awards throughout her career, finally winning best supporting actress in 2021 for the romantic comedy “Love Affair(s).”

Speaking to The Guardian in 2013 about the difficult role in “Our Children,” she said, “For my part I went home every weekend, and stayed with my family, which is a very safe place. Making a film like that is something that you have to survive.”

More recently, she co-starred in “Close,” Lukas Dhont’s tender boyhood drama, which brought her back to Cannes again in 2022. She saw similarities between her young co-star and her own breakout role with “Rosetta.”

“For me to be here and to come back here after 23 years, it’s very emotional and there is like a reflection between Eden (Dambrine) and myself because I remember when I was here the first time with ‘Rosetta,’” she told The Associated Press. “It was like a very powerful movie with this main character, which is in every scene, every, every shot. And that’s the same for him.”

Dequenne returned to the festival again in 2024 for the 25th anniversary of “Rosetta.” Her last film was Frédéric Jardin’s post-apocalyptic thriller “Survive,” which came out earlier this year.

While she loved taking on work in England, France and Belgium, she had little interest in Hollywood.

“I have been to Hollywood and had meetings, but really they don’t do the kind of films I like to make. And everything is kind of boring, no?” she said in the interview with The Guardian. “Honestly, it’s not a fun place, or at least not my kind of fun.”

She is survived by her husband, director and producer Michel Ferracci, and daughter, Milla Savarese.

Lindsey Bahr, The Associated Press