Michel Delahaye was born in 1929 in Vertou close to Nantes, Bretagne,
France. Raised by a very religious father who was an ex-pilot of the
Great War (World War I).
He attended a Jesuit private school in Saint Malo, during World War II,
under the German invasion.
In 1951, he did his military service in Germany. In 1953, after being
judged guilty of petty theft, he met the owner of a docking company who
gave him a chance as a manager of transports, in Nantes seaport.
In 1956, he became a probationary in the postal services, then a
factory worker. When he moved to Paris, he worked in news stands then
in a book store, became a reporter for the "Radar" magazine, then
worked at the prestigious "Detective" magazine.
He became a movie critic, then assistant director. Thanks to
Éric Rohmer he started working for the world
renowned "Les Cahiers du Cinema" revue in November 1959 with all the
new wave of French directors, later starts teaching cinema at La FEMIS(
formerly called l'HIDEC).
He had the privilege to work with
'Francois Truffaut',
Jean-Luc Godard and interviewed
Roman Polanski and
Carl Theodor Dreyer, and many
others. He was a close friend of
Jean Renoir.
He was fired from "les Cahiers..." in the late 1969 for being an
anti-Marxiste. So he became a security officer, then a full time actor
for theater, movies and television.
In 1974 he wrote a novel "L'Archange et Robinson font du Bateau"
destined to be a movie directed by
Claude Miller and
Gérard Depardieu as the lead role but
the project never came to completion, so his script got published by
the publishing house Champs Libre owned by Gerard Lebovici the founder
of Artmedia agency.
In late 1984, he became a social worker in a emergency team named
24/24, but quit in 1994.
In 1998, he contributed to writing critics for "La Lettre du Cinema"
and helped its young staff in screenwriting and acted in their movies.
He has two sons: Emmanuel the oldest and
Mathew Lorenceau the youngest (5 years
apart).
