It was seeing the shooting of Marc Allégret's film Entrée des artistes that triggered his desire to go to Paris to train to be an actor.

He trained at the Cours Simon in Paris before entering the Conservatoire national supérieur d'art dramatique .

From that time, he went on to appear in more than 150 films, including Max Ophüls' films La Ronde (1950) and Le Plaisir (1952), Jacques Becker's Édouard et Caroline (1951), Sacha Guitry's films Si Versailles m'était conté (Royal Affairs in Versailles) (1954) and Napoléon (1955), Alfred Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Jean Cocteau's Le Testament d'Orphée (1960), Le souffle au cœur (Murmur of the Heart) (1971), and La Nuit de Varennes (That Night in Varennes) (1982).

He appeared extensively in French films and television productions from the 1970s until his death, often playing cynical characters or grumpy old men.

This marriage produced three children: Pascal (who died aged one year), Fiona, and Manuel, the latter two also becoming actors.