Bernard Pruvost, the unforgettable wacky gendarme of “little quinquin”, died at 68 years old

Poetic and burlesque revelation of the series “P’tit Quinquin”, the non-professional actor had become a recurring figure of the works of Bruno Dumont, while continuing to work as a worker in his hometown of Calais.

SAt the disappearance is as discreet as its appearance was striking: Bernard Pruvost. In addition, revelation of the series of Bruno Dumont bernard pruvost, unforgettable wacky gendarme Pirti frodied at the age of 68 at home in Calais. Coutumiers of the recruitment of non -professional actors. the filmmaker and his casting director had found their future star, then unemployed, in a reintegration association. By this bifurcation of destiny. Bernard Pruvost had thus found himself on Arte, in the shoes of Commander Van der Weyden, a gendarme investigating the strange affair of human pieces found in cows.

With his agitated face of tics. his brushy eyebrows and his singular speech, the beginner, flanked by an assistant played by another non-pro, Philippe Jore, had imposed in the frame a burlesque presence, somewhere between the neglected sagacity of the inspector Columbo and the grace of a northern charlot. “” We are at the heart of evil there, Carpentier He said, memorable, in an access to laconic philosophy. Back to chase extraterrestrials in the rest of the series. Coinchoin and bernard pruvost, unforgettable wacky gendarme the Z’inhumansin 2018, the duo was also invited to Bruno Dumont’s latest film, The Empire (2024) where Bernard Pruvost, returned in the meantime to work in a Calais workshop, also rubbed shoulders with Camille Cottin and Fabrice Luchini.

For the detractors of the Dumont method. the tightrope walkers of Bernard Pruvost, between discomfort and poetry, questioned the puppet side of the filmmaker, who directed him to the headset and confided after the fact Telerama that his tics were born during the shooting, due “toe his contraction and his fatigue ». It is nonetheless undeniable that he was puncturing the screen. An actor born discovered late. the man who had retired as a worker in 2019 died by taking with him the mystery of his alchemy with the camera.