The Last Surviving Member Of The "Casablanca" Cast Has Died
Madeleine Lebeau, who starred as the jilted lover of Humphrey Bogart’s Rick Blaine, was 92.
Madeline Lebeau, the French actress believed to have been the last surviving member of the classic film Casablanca, has died. She was 92.
Lebeau died on May 1 in Spain after breaking her thighbone, her stepson, the documentary filmmaker Carlo Alberto Pinelli, told The Hollywood Reporter on Saturday.
Lebeau starred as Yvonne, the jilted lover of Humphrey Bogart's Rick Blaine, in the iconic 1942 movie. According to the film's IMDB page, she was the last surviving member of the movie's principal actors.
In one memorable scene, she arrives at "Rick's Café Américain" on the arm of a German soldier in an effort to spite Bogart's character after being spurned by him.
When the German troops begin singing a patriotic song, the French refugees in the café respond in kind with an uplifting, defiant version of "La Marseillaise."
When the singing concludes Lebeau's character shouts, "Vive la France! Vive la démocratie!"
Lebeau's tears in the scene, shown in misty close-up, were drawn from real experience, with the actress herself having escaped Vichy France for the United States.
She was one of several wartime European refugees to appear in the film, according to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Her then-husband, Marcel Dalio, with whom she escaped France, also appeared in Casablanca, as the bar's croupier, Emil.
Lebeau also appeared in another iconic film, Federico Fellini's 1963 masterpiece 8½.
According to her IMBD page, she retired from acting in 1970.