A glorious blonde beauty in her youth, who hurled herself into old age after her husband Yves Montand's much publicized affair with Marilyn Monroe, Simone Signoret was both French icon and international star.

This unflinching, captivating biography shows Signoret as a personally and professionally complex woman who was gutsy and uncompromising in her commitments. Although she is best known for her roles in such films as La Ronde, Diabolique, and Casque d'Or, Signoret played out her riveting life in many arenas: professional, personal and political.

Tough, self-deprecating, funny and articulate, Signoret was an actress whose star quality was based not on sex appeal like that of her rival Monroe, but on her extraordinary ability to communicate passion. As her beauty began to wane, she compensated by throwing herself into her intellectual life - she held salons, wrote books and stepped up her political activities. Even her Academy Award, for Room at the Top, was a political statement.

Signoret was loved by millions as much for her commanding character as for her great talent. When she died of cancer in 1985, at the age of sixty-four, thousands of mourners - ordinary people as well as French actors, writers and politicians - attended her funeral in Paris.