Béatrice Dalle

Béatrice Dalle (born 19 December 1964) is a French actress and model. She has appeared in over fifty films^[1] and is best known internationally for her debut role in the 1986 film 37°2 le matin (also released as Betty Blue). Béatrice Dalle is renowned for her intense and unconventional roles, often portraying characters that are both provocative and transgressive.^[2]

Biography

Dalle was born in Brest, Finistère, France, as Béatrice Cabarrou.^[3][4] She was raised Catholic^[5] and grew up in Le Mans with her mother, father, and an older sister. At age 15, Dalle ran away from home to live in Paris.^[6]

Career

Dalle was working as a model when she met filmmaker Jean-Jacques Beineix. Beineix cast her in the lead role of the 1986 film 37°2 le matin (released in the UK and the USA as Betty Blue), which received BAFTA and Oscar nominations for Best Foreign Language Film and made Dalle a star.

She went on to appear in a series of major roles in French films, including the 1989 film Chimère, which was entered into the 1989 Cannes Film Festival.^[7]

She featured in the 1987 music video for Buster Poindexter's version of "Oh Me Oh My (I'm fool for you Baby)" and in the 1991 music video for "Move to Memphis" by Norwegian band a-ha.^[8]

In 1988, Dalle was interviewed by Clive James in "Postcard from Paris", where she said she was tired of Paris and wanted to move to New York.^[9]

She starred in Jim Jarmusch's Night on Earth in 1991.

In 1997, she was cast in The Blackout, her first film made in the United States.

In 2001, Dalle appeared in the controversial film Trouble Every Day, in which she played a compulsive sexual cannibal. She starred in the 2007 film À l'intérieur, in which she played a cruel psychopath stalking a pregnant woman.

Controversies

Dalle has been arrested on several occasions for shoplifting, drug possession and assault.^[10] She has had run-ins with the law in France and was arrested for alleged drug possession in America. An investigation into a suspected drug trafficking network led to Dalle being questioned in Paris as a witness in 2005.^[11]

Interviewed on the French TV programme Divan in 2016, Dalle stated that when she used to work in a morgue with her friends, they sold body parts of corpses, and while on acid, they ate a dead man's ear.^[12][5]

Personal life

In 1985, she married the painter Jean-François Dalle, whom she divorced in 1988.^[13][14] She kept his patronym.^[14]

After her divorce, she had a brief relationship with lawyer Arno Klarsfeld.^[14]

In 1994, Dalle met JoeyStarr, a rapper from the French group NTM, and they began a romantic relationship. They remained together for ten tumultuous years.^[15][16] JoeyStarr later said that they had to separate and keep some distance between them because they were a fusional couple.^[17] Dalle and JoeyStarr separated in 2005.^[18] They remained inseparable afterwards.^[15][17]

In January 2005, while making a film about prison life in Brest, Dalle met Guenaël Meziani, serving a 12-year prison sentence for assaulting and raping his ex-girlfriend. She married him after 24 one-hour visits and spoke on his behalf at hearings for his early release.^[10][19] According to a 2015 profile of Dalle, she said the marriage was "a complete disaster" once Meziani was released from prison. Their divorce was finalised in July 2014.^[11][20]

After her second divorce, Dalle was in a relationship with a man named Eddy, a mixed martial arts (MMA) instructor.^[14] She then began a relationship with Paul Bichet-Galaup, 32 years her junior.^[14] In February 2026, Dalle said that she and JoeyStarr had not talked for two years.^[15]

In a 2018 interview Dalle stated she was a practicing Catholic.^[5]

Filmography

Theatre

Music videos