Irene Papas was a Greek actress and singer who starred in over 70 films in a career spanning more than 50 years. She acquired international notoriety with such famous award-winning films as The Guns of Navarone (1961), Zorba the Greek (1964), and Z (1969).
Irene was a formidable protagonist in films such as The Trojan Women (1971) and Iphigenia (1977). She portrayed the title parts in Antigone (1961) and Electra (1962).
Greek actress and singer Irene Papas dies at the age of 96
It is apposite that Irene Papas, who has died aged 96, was at her zenith when playing the heroines in cinema versions of traditional Greek dramas. Notwithstanding her various parts in a wide range of Hollywood, international and Greek films, including The Guns of Navarone (1961), Zorba the Greek (1964), and Z (1969), Papas always gave the feeling that there was an Electra, Antigone or Clytemnestra simmering beneath the surface. She harmonized well between theatrical heritage and the film closeup, her strong, expressive face being especially eloquent in periods of mute pain.
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Irene Papas Age, Family, Early Life
Irene Papas was born on 3 September 1929 (96 years old) in Chiliomodi, Corinthia, Greece. She holds a Greece Nationality and she belongs to the white ethnic group. Her Zodiac sign is Virgo.
Irene Papas’s mother, Eleni Prevezanou, was a schoolteacher, while her father, Stavros Lelekos taught classical drama at the Sofikós school in Corinth.
Irene Papas Husband, What about her Children?
Papas In 1947 Irene Papas married the film director Alkis Papas; they divorced in 1951. In 1954 she met the actor Marlon Brando and they had a long love affair, which they kept hidden at the time. Fifty years later, when Brando died, she remarked that “I have never since loved a man as I loved Marlon.
He was the great passion of my life, absolutely the man I cared about the most and also the one I regarded most, two qualities that typically are impossible to reconcile”. Her second marriage was to the film producer José Kohn in 1957; that marriage was later annulled.
Irene Papas Career, What was her profession?
Irene Papas began her acting career in Greece in variety and traditional theatre, in plays by Ibsen, Shakespeare, and classical Greek tragedy, before moving into film in 1951. She continued to appear on stage from time to time, including in New York in shows such as Dostoevsky’s The Idiot. She played in Iphigenia in Aulis in Broadway’s Circle in the Square Theatre in 1968, and in Medea in 1973. Reviewing the production in The New York Times, Clive Barnes characterized her as a “really excellent, controlled Medea”, burning with a “carefully muted passion”, continuously ferocious.
The theatre writer Walter Kerr similarly admired Papas’s Medea; both Barnes and Kerr noticed in her depiction what Barnes called “her persistent drive and an unyielding quest for justice”. Albert Bermel thought Papas’s presentation of Medea as a sympathetic lady was a success in acting. She appeared in The Bacchae in 1980 at Circle in the Square, and in Electra at the Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus in 1985.
Papas won Best Actress awards at the Berlin International Film Festival for Antigone and from the National Board of Review for The Trojan Women. Her professional achievements include the Golden Arrow Award in 1993 at Hamptons International Film Festival and the Golden Lion Award in 2009 at the Venice Biennale.
Culture Boycott
In 1967, Papas, a lifelong liberal, called for a “culture boycott” against the “Fourth Reich”, meaning the military dictatorship of Greece at that time. Her opposition to the regime led her, and other musicians such as Theodorakis, whose songs she sang, into exile when the military junta came to power in Greece in 1967; she moved into temporary exile in Italy and New York. When the junta fell in 1974, she returned to Greece, spending time both in Athens and in her family’s rural residence in Chiliomodi, as well as continuing to work in Rome.
In 1969, the RCA label published Papas’ vinyl LP, Songs of Theodorakis (INTS 1033). (INTS 1033). This features 11 songs sung in Greek, conducted by Harry Lemonopoulos, and produced by Andy Wiswell, with sleeve notes in English by Michael Cacoyannis. It was published on CD in 2005 (FM 1680). (FM 1680). Papas met Mikis Theodorakis from working with him on Zorba the Greek as early as 1964. The critic Clive Barnes wrote of her singing performance on the album that “Irene Pappas is known to the public as an actress, but that is why she sings with such intensity, her very appearance, with her raven hair, is an equally dynamic means of expression”.
How much is Irene Papas Net Worth?
However, we don’t have any specific information about Irene Papas’s net worth.
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Which school and college did She go to?
The particulars on the high school Irene Papas attended or the faculty she graduated from are all under review.
Is She available on any kind of social media platform?
Irene Papas is not active on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.
Physical Appearance of Irene Papas’s Height, Weight
Height | Not Available |
Hair Color | Black and white |
Eye color | Black |
Weight | Not Available |
Body type | Fit |
Sexual orientation | Straight |
Interesting facts about Irene Papas’s should be knows
Nationality | Greece |
Ethnicity | White |
Zodiac sign | Virgo |
Relationship Status | Married |