Jacky Boufroura, known professionally as Jacques Villeret, was born on February 6, 1951, in Tours, France. Raised by his mother and step‑father Raymond Villeret, he adopted the name Villeret at age forty after discovering his Algerian birth‑father. His first acting work emerged in the early 1970s with small roles in Yves Boisset’s RAS (1973) and Claude Lelouch’s Robert et Robert (1978), the latter earning him the César Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1979. Jacques Villeret achieved nationwide recognition with the 1981 comedy La Soupe aux choux, playing the extraterrestrial La Denrée, followed by the 1983 film Papy fait de la résistance and the 1998 classic Le Dîner de cons, for which he received the César for Best Actor in 1999. He continued to appear in Jean Becker’s Les Enfants du marais (1999) and Un crime au Paradis (2001) until his death from an internal hemorrhage on 28 January 2005 in Évreux.
