Vincent Lindon

Vincent Lindon is a French actor and filmmaker born on July 15, 1959. Over a career spanning several decades, he has established himself as a prominent figure in international cinema, earning critical recognition at major events such as the Cannes Film Festival, the César Awards, and the Venice International Film Festival. Beyond his performances on screen, he has served in leadership capacities for prominent festival competition juries.

Lindon grew up in a family connected to business, journalism, and public administration. His father, Laurent Lindon, was the director of the company Audioline, while his mother, Alix Dufaure, worked as a journalist for Marie Claire. Through his maternal lineage, he is a descendant of former French Prime Minister Jules Dufaure and Marshal Rémy Joseph Isidore Exelmans. His paternal grandfather, Raymond Lindon, was a magistrate who served as the mayor of Étretat between 1929 and 1959, and his uncle Jérôme Lindon was the director of Les Éditions de Minuit. His great-grandparents were Fernande Citroën, the elder sister of André Citroën, and Alfred Lindon, a Kraków-born Jewish jeweler and modern art collector.

After completing his scientific baccalaureate at the Lycée Victor-Duruy, Lindon entered a business school but departed after twenty-two days. In 1979, his mother helped him gain an internship as an assistant costume designer on Alain Resnais's film My American Uncle, where he worked alongside actor Gérard Depardieu. He subsequently spent six months in New York assisting with radio promotion for Cachalot Records, a music label founded by his uncle Eric Dufaure. Upon returning to Paris, his stepfather Pierre Bénichou helped him secure work managing microphones for comedian Coluche's 1981 tour. Lindon also worked as a courier for the newspaper Le Matin de Paris before enrolling in acting classes at the Cours Florent.

Since beginning his screen career in the 1980s, Lindon has collaborated with a wide range of notable film directors. His credits include projects helmed by filmmakers such as Claude Sautet, Claude Lelouch, Claire Denis, Stéphane Brizé, Julia Ducournau, Coline Serreau, Bertrand Blier, Jacques Doillon, Nicole Garcia, Emmanuel Carrère, Xavier Giannoli, Alain Cavalier, Mathieu Kassovitz, Benoît Jacquot, Jean-Jacques Beineix, Diane Kurys, Claude Pinoteau, and Pierre Jolivet.

Lindon achieved significant acclaim for his lead role in Stéphane Brizé's 2015 feature The Measure of a Man. His performance won the Best Actor Award at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, the César Award for Best Actor at the 41st ceremony, and the Best Actor prize at the 46th International Film Festival of India. Earlier, he received the Swann d'Or for best actor at the 2005 Cabourg Film Festival for La Moustache. In 2024, he won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor at the Venice International Film Festival for his starring role in The Quiet Son.

In addition to his acting honors, Lindon chaired the jury of the 39th Deauville American Film Festival in 2013 and served as president of the main competition jury for the 75th Cannes Film Festival in 2022, following Spike Lee. In 2024, he starred in Quentin Dupieux's feature Le Deuxième Acte, which opened the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival.

In the 1980s, Lindon was in a relationship with Claude Chirac, daughter of President Jacques Chirac, lasting nearly ten years. He was later in a high-profile relationship with Caroline, Princess of Monaco. He has a son, Marcel, born in 1996. In 1998, he married actress Sandrine Kiberlain, whom he met on the set of L'Irrésolu in 1993; the couple had a daughter, Suzanne, in 2000 before separating in 2003. Lindon subsequently dated Chiara Mastroianni after portraying the romantic partner of her mother, Catherine Deneuve, in the film Belle maman.