Denise Darcel Dead: French Actress Dies At 87

LOS ANGELES — Denise Darcel, the French-born actress known for vampy roles in such films as "Vera Cruz" and "Thunder in the Pines," has died. She was 87.

Darcel's son, Craig, said Monday that she died Dec. 23 at a Los Angeles hospital from complications from an emergency surgery to repair a ruptured aneurysm.

After coming to the U.S. in 1947, Darcel starred opposite several leading men in a string of films in the '50s, including "Battleground" with Van Johnson, "Tarzan and the Slave Girl" with Lex Barker, "Westward the Women" with Robert Taylor and "Young Man with Ideas" with Glenn Ford.

She most famously played a vivacious double-crossing countess in 1954's "Vera Cruz" opposite Burt Lancaster and Gary Cooper.

Darcel is also survived by another son, Chris.

Watch Darcel sing to Glenn Ford in "Young Man With Ideas":

Comments

[mater]

02:23 PM on 01/11/2012

She was gorgeous.

[DickClark]

10:15 AM on 01/11/2012

...."Thunder in the Pines"??...........please.........

[Hopalongpoppyseed]

01:22 AM on 01/11/2012

Condolences to the family. The lady lives on in celluloid and is quite delightful.

[Flight]

07:25 PM on 01/10/2012

Sorry, never heard of her.

[Hopalongpoppyseed]

01:21 AM on 01/11/2012

That is why we study film history. Did you watch the video? She was wonderful. As a man in the third act, I look at that beauty and that presentation and I find it delightful. Here's a glass held high to beauty in its prime.

[danny saunders]

11:52 PM on 01/09/2012

Well, it was bound to come to this eventually.