They finally separated when Tchéky was 13, but when his mother kicked his father out of the house she ordered him to take Tchéky, too. That early instance of maternal abandonment would go on to both enrich his acting career and psychologically haunt him for the rest of his life. Channeling his feelings through art - especially through acting – offered a way to cope with his childhood trauma.
“I remember in that period feeling really alone,” he told The Times. “My mother used to take me to museums, and so I went back to the museums she took me to and I remember having this experience like the painting is talking to you: you’re in tears, it opens your heart. It gave meaning to what I was going through.”
He did not see his mother for six years after that, but he said he forgave her as he grew older.
While Tchéky’s father, a delivery man and builder, pushed for him to study accountancy as he approached his late teens, Tchéky had dreams of becoming an actor after performing in school plays. At 19 he quit college to study drama at the Cyrano theatre while supporting himself through various industrial jobs: “carrying meat, working in train stations, driving”.
French actor Tcheky Karyo poses at the Noga Hilton hotel, for the promotion of "Kiss of the dragon", directed by Chris Nahon and produced by Luc Besson, during the 54th Cannes Film Festival, 13 May 2001. AFP PHOTO ANNE-CHRISTINE POUJOULAT (Photo by ANNE-CHRISTINE POUJOULAT / AFP) (Photo by ANNE-CHRISTINE POUJOULAT/AFP via Getty Images)AFP via Getty Images
His impressive silver screen debut as a psychotic gangster in the 1982 crime thriller La Balance led to further arthouse film roles in in the crime genre, but it was only once he appeared as a hunter in Jean-Jacques Annaud’s adventure film The Bear (1988) and a secret agent in Luc Besson’s thriller La Femme Nikita (1990) that he broke into international consciousness.
Tchéky moved to Los Angeles, learnt English and, over the next two decades, made as many films abroad as he did in France, playing supporting roles in Ridley Scott’s 1992 historical epic 1492: Conquest of Paradise, the 1997 black comedy Addicted to Love, American historical drama The Patriot (2000) and hit comedy Saving Grace (2000), among many others. He took a turn in the starring role of the medieval prophet in Roger Christian’s 1994 biopic Nostradamus, but mainly held firm to playing “baddies” in Hollywood films, from the drug baron Fouchet in Bad Boys (1995) to the Russian defence minister in the James Bond film GoldenEye (1995).
When he took on the role of Julien Baptiste in the British anthology drama The Missing, which later led to the spin-off series Baptiste, he wasn’t sure his English was good enough. But Tchéky - a polyglot who spoke Spanish, Italian, Arabic and Hebrew – ultimately found that he could be more himself as the sensitive Baptiste than any other character he’d played: “My sensibility is feminine as much as masculine,” he told The Times. “That’s why I love this character: I don’t have to put up a mask.”
Tchéky is survived by a daughter from his first marriage to actress Isabelle Pasco, and a son and daughter from his subsequent marriage to actress Valérie Keruzoré.
His family announced his death on 31 October in a statement published by AFP.
