French film icon Catherine Deneuve hospitalized after stroke

PARIS (AP) —  French actress Catherine Deneuve has had a mild stroke while filming her latest movie, the screen star’s family said Wednesday.

The 76-year-old Deneuve suffered a “very limited and therefore reversible” stroke, according to a family statement sent to the Associated Press by the media representative for Artmedia, the agency that represents Deneuve. It said no further statements were planned.

“Fortunately, she has no motor deficits (but) must, of course, take some time to rest.”

Deneuve was hospitalized in Paris, but the family didn’t disclose the name of the facility. No details were given on when she had the stroke, but French media reported that it happened late Tuesday or early Wednesday.

Deneuve has been filming “De son vivant” (In One’s Lifetime), the story of a mother who loses her son to cancer. It was the third film by Emmanuelle Bercot, the director, starring Deneuve.

With her long blond hair, heavy eyelids and sultry stare, Oscar-nominated Deneuve first came to prominence in Jacques Demy’s 1964 musical “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.”

But longevity has been one of the star’s greatest skills. She dazzled red carpets as fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent’s muse and won myriad awards in a career that spans seven decades.

She has won several César Awards, France’s answer to the Oscars, including for Francois Truffaut’s 1980 hit “The Last Metro” and consolidated her status as one of France’s most famous exports with an Academy Award nomination for 1992’s “Indochine,” a drama set in colonial French Indochina during the 1930s to 1950s.

She hasn’t stopped. Deneuve starred in a film released earlier this year, “Fete de Famille” (Happy Birthday), directed by Cédric Kahn.

Her own family grew via her romantic involvement with several famous men. She had a son, Christian Vadim, with director Roger Vadim, and a daughter, French actress Chiara Mastroianni, with actor Marcello Mastroianni, with whom she had lived.

It was arguably her prize-winning turn in Luis Buñuel’s 1967 masterpiece “Belle de Jour,” the avant-garde story of a bored young housewife who spends her weekday afternoons as a posh prostitute, for which she may be best remembered.