Tonie Marshall

Tonie Marshall

Tonie Marshall (November 29, 1951 – March 12, 2020) was a French-American actress, screenwriter, and film director. After acting in several of Jacques Demy's films, including A Slightly Pregnant Man and La Naissance du Jour, Marshall cites to have taken influence from his direction in the sense of creating whimsical atmospheres and rooting the stories with more of a female-centric narrative. In her most notable film, Venus Beauty Institute, Marshall touched on the theme of finding love from a female perspective, and how it can fundamentally be more difficult because of how it strays from the traditional dynamic of courtship. She explained how “in a practical sense, it’s complicated to have abandon [oneself] into a man’s arms and, at the same time, stay very tough because you have to work…”. This carefully expresses the vulnerabilities women endure when heavily committing to relationships, similar to much of Demy's work, including The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and The Young Girls of Rochefort.

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