Robert Castel | WatchedThis
Robert Castel
Acting
Biography
Robert Castel (in Arabic: روبرت كاستل), whose real name is Robert Adolphe Moyal, is an actor, musician and comedian, born on May 21, 1933 in Algiers in the Bab El-Oued district, Algeria. Robert Castel began as a musician, tar player, then guitarist, accompanying his father, composer violinist, and singer of light French-Arab songs. Young actor in the troupe of the Regional Center of Dramatic Art of Algiers, Robert Castel plays the role of Robert Le Bègue in the theatrical improvisation show on the life of the pieds-noirs, La Famille Hernandez, which is created by Geneviève Baïlac on September 17, 1957 in Paris. Having cut his teeth in music hall, Robert Castel began his film career at the age of 24 in Les Amants De Demain by Marcel Blistène, then in Un témoin dans la ville by Édouard Molinaro. In 1962, Robert Castel left the newly independent Algeria and settled in Paris with Lucette Sahuquet (who died in 1987), whom he married. The couple inaugurated their sketches as a duo that year, notably at the Olympia where they opened for Frank Sinatra, Marlene Dietrich and Philippe Clay. In the 1970s, the comedian, lively and provocative, did a lot of television sketches with his favorite partner and Enrico Macias. For the big screen, this dark-haired comedian, with a clear forehead, who speaks with his hands, abandoned his favorite register. Having become the figure of "pied-noir humor" in France, he played alongside Edith Piaf in Les Amants de demain by Marcel Blistène, Pierre Richard in Le Grand Blond avec une chaussure noire by Yves Robert, and Isabelle Huppert in Dupont Lajoie by Yves Boisset. In 1982, he made a notable appearance in Algerian cinema by playing in Hassan taxi, directed by Mohamed Slim Riad, alongside Rouiched (Ahmed Ayad), Ouardia Hamitouche and Sidali Kouiret. He appeared in more than thirty films in total, until the early 2000s. Robert Castel kept a low profile for a few years before returning to the stage, this time in a musical, in 2007 thanks to the El-Gusto project. This project, which seeks to bring together Algerian, Jewish and Muslim musicians who were part of Hadj M'hamed El Anka's Algiers Chaâbi orchestra in the early 1950s, resulted in a documentary film that won international awards, the recording of an album and an international tour that took a troupe of 42 musicians to countries such as France, Morocco, Tunisia, Switzerland, Belgium, the United States and the Netherlands. In 2008, Robert Castel signed his autobiography, Je pose 75 [son âge], mais je retaîtres tout. He returned to the stage in 2013 to present his last one-man show, "Nostalgérie". He died on December 5, 2020 in Paris, at the age of 87.
Filmography Movies
Acting
Par ici la monnaie
All the inhabitants of an old house are swindlers, dreaming only of the big score that will enable them to survive an announced eviction. They end up pulling it off together, by building a fake tollgate.
Le bahut va craquer
The students of a local school unite in mutiny against their headmaster and two teachers.
Three Men on a Horse
A man has found a way to win any bet he places on a horse. However, he himself must never be the person to place the bet.
Two Men in Town
A former bank robber is released after 10 years in prison. He gets help from a social-worker, but gets harassed by an old cop from his past.
The Common Man
Georges Lajoie is a Parisian café owner. As every summer, Georges, his wife Ginette and grown-up son Léon go on holiday to Loulou's campsite, where they meet up with the Schumacher family (whose father is a bailiff) and the Colin family (who sells bras in the markets). This year, their peace is slightly disturbed by the proximity of a construction site where foreign workers are employed. Xenophobic comments are made. One evening at the ball, a fight breaks out between Lajoie, Albert Schumacher and two algerian immigrant workers...
The Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe
A hapless orchestra player becomes an unwitting pawn of rival factions within the French secret service after he is chosen as a decoy by being identified as a super secret agent.
The Sandmen
Alain runs Le Detour, a small cafe in Paris where Antoine works. Antoine is reunited with his sister Marie when she's released from prison; they are very close, perhaps abnormally so, but she's not aware that Antoine has fallen into cahoots with Stephane, who works as a waiter at another cafe. Damien, a local businessman, is pressuring Alain to expand Le Detour, and cut his nephew Xavier in for a percentage as a manager. While Alain waffles on Damien's proposal, Xavier offers Antoine a chance to make some money under the table by delivering some drugs to a cadre of dealers. Antoine makes the drop and picks up the payment, but runs off with the money rather than bringing it back to Xavier, which proves to have tragic consequences for Antoine and his friends.
Take It from the Top
Tired of being a housewife, Annie wants to work. Between her professional life and her responsibilities as a parent, she can no longer cope. She decides to leave and starts writing a memoir of her life...
There Once Was a Cop
Campana, a commissar at the drugs bureau of Paris police gets an undercover job in Nice to catch an Italian-French mafia boss. As he slips into the identity of a gangster's brother, who was already killed, he has to play the role of a loving husband with child - something that is not so easy for a confirmed single like Campana. Unfortunately American killers chase behind the Nice mafia clan too, in order to get control of French drug trades to USA.
Stop Fooling Around... Soldier!
At a French military outpost, a group of lackadaisical servicemen find plenty of time to make trouble, enjoy nature and pursue beautiful women.
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