Didier Sandre
Didier Maffre, known professionally as Didier Sandre, is a French actor and stage director born in Paris on 17 August 1946 and appointed sociétaire of the Comédie‑Française in 2020. He made his debut in 1968 in Paul Claudel’s L’Échange and, from the 1970s onward, became a prominent figure in public theatre, collaborating with major directors such as Catherine Dasté, Bernard Sobel, Jorge Lavelli, Patrice Chéreau, Giorgio Strehler, Luc Bondy, and Antoine Vitez. Alongside this, he has appeared regularly in private‑theatre productions, including works by Claudel, Anouilh, Rampal, and Margulies. His stage career includes notable performances in Bérénice (directed by Lambert Wilson), Le Laboureur de Bohême (Christian Schiaretti), and Monsieur chasse! by Feydeau. He joined the Comédie‑Française in 2013 and became a full member in 2020. Sandre has also worked extensively in film and television, appearing in Pascale Ferran’s Petits Arrangements avec les morts, Éric Rohmer’s Autumn Tale, Abraham Segal’s Le Mystère Paul, and Mikhaël Hers’s Memory Lane. On television, he has acted in numerous dramas, including Saint‑Germain ou la Négociation, Le Sang noir, and notably portrayed Louis XIV in Nina Companeez’s L’Allée du Roi and the Baron de Charlus in her adaptation of In Search of Lost Time. A frequent narrator in concert settings, he has performed in major repertoire works by Stravinsky, Debussy, Beethoven, Honegger, Haydn, Prokofiev, Grieg, Poulenc, and others, collaborating with leading orchestras, conductors such as Pierre Boulez and Myung‑Whun Chung, and renowned soloists including Alexandre Tharaud, Abdel Rahman El Bacha, and Emmanuelle Bertrand.
Filmography · 49
An Officer and a Spy
2019 · General Boisdeffre
Le Cid
2026 · Don Diègue
The Passengers of the Night
2022 · Jean
Icon of French Cinema
2023 · Frédéric
Les Grandes Familles
1989 · Gabriel De Voos
Saint-Germain ou La négociation
2003 · M. de Méylines
L'Allée du roi
1996 · Louis XIV
An Autumn Tale
1998 · Étienne
An Impossible Love
2018 · Philippe's Father
À la recherche du temps perdu
2011 · Le Baron de Charlus
Hell Train
1985 · Dalbret
Richelieu ou La journée des dupes
1983 · Cardinal de Richelieu
Under the Rainbow
2013 · Guillaume Casseul
L'allée du Roi (Version courte)
1996 · Louis XIV
Not My Type
2014 · Le père de Clément
One Night
2012 · Le procureur Lacourt
Frank Capra, il était une fois l'Amérique
2020 · Narrator
The Black Pharaoh, the Savage and the Princess
2022 · Amon / Duc et Chambell...
The Legend of Princess Parva
2003 · Parva's father (voice)
The Woman of My Life
1986 · Xavier
Peer Gynt
1981 · Quatrième jeune homme...
Lovers of the Café Flore
2006 · Georges de Beauvoir
Origins of Life
2001 · Narrator (voice)
Hell
2006 · Le père de Hell
Le Petit-Maître Corrigé
2018 · Le Comte, père d'Horte...
Mensonge
1993 · Charles Melville
Manon Roland
1989 · Robespierre
L'enfant éternel
2002 · Richard
Coming to Terms with the Dead
1994 · Vincent
Cyrano de Bergerac
2017 · de Guiche
Sous un autre jour
2009 · Martin
Passion interdite
1998 · Richard
Moi, Louis enfant de la mine - Courrières 1906
2007 · Ricq
Les Damnés
2016 · Joachim von Essenbeck
Les Fourberies de Scapin
2017 · Géronte
Électre / Oreste
2019 · Tyndare
Memory Lane
2010 · François
Shadow Dance
1983 · Gérard
Photo
2012 · Uriel
The Fabulous History of Eau de Cologne
2015 · Narrator (voice)
Boulevard des hirondelles
1993 · Pascal Capeau
Le Soulier de Satin
2025 · Don Pélage/Le second c...
Le Soulier de Satin
1987 · Don Rodrigue
La femme d'un seul homme
1998 · Richard
A.L.F.
2012 · Le psychiatre
Roméo et Juliette
2018 · Capulet
François Mitterrand & Anne Pingeot: Pieces of a Love Story
2021 · Narrator (voice)
Les années perdues
2015 · Daniel Launey
Montparnasse
2009 · Serge