Death of Simon Eine

October 7, 2020

In February 2011, a new “Abadi child” appeared in our lives. You were researching your childhood and suddenly discovered, like many of us, the existence of Odette and Moussa. We met at the Mémorial de la Shoah over the documents handed over after Odette’s death, feverishly going through those old papers, trying to decipher what they might reveal between the lines about an unknown part of your life, with Colette, your wife, at your side. There, with emotion, you discovered a photograph of yourself you had never seen.

How well I understood that quest, having undertaken it myself a few years earlier – that stunning turmoil that seizes your whole being when a part of yourself is revealed to you by chance, with the feeling of being both the same and someone else!

I came to know you, and my regret was immense when I realised how little time separated your arrival from the death of Moussa, whom you could have known; both of you came from the world of theatre – how well you could have got on! For yes, you came from that family of the theatre, which was your whole passion and in which you practised every role. Who better than you could speak of that “house”? You retraced those stages of your life in an autobiographical book in 2012, “Des étoiles plein les poches” (Pockets full of stars), in which you explain the chance that led you to act. It is impossible here to list all your achievements as an actor, a performer and a director. There would be so much to write, to describe, from your entry into the Comédie-Française in 1960 with your first play, Polyeucte, until 2014, playing the classic authors – Racine, Romains, Voltaire, Hugo, etc. – under prestigious directors. Sometimes, at the same time, you changed role and perspective to become the conductor yourself, directing the classic authors. Cinema was no stranger to you, and I discovered with amazement your parts in series I watched back when I did not know you, and in films, notably Michel Deville’s “La Lectrice”.

Your decorations are the same as those that rewarded Moussa: Knight of the Legion of Honour, Officer of the National Order of Merit, Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters.

On Wednesday, September 30, you took your last bow and drew the crimson stage curtain, leaving for good. We will miss you.

Dédée