Jacques Viale (born 1931) was a wannabe actor, born in the agrarian Auvergne region of central France. In 1949 Roger Vadim was living in Paris with his best friend, actor Christian Marquand. At the time Vadim had worked as a stage actor and journalist, but had not yet become a film director. The two were having lunch on the terrace of La Coupole, a former hangout of Hemingway and Henry Miller in Montparnasse. They noticed a startlingly handsome man seated alone at a nearby table, where he had removed his shoe to massage an aching foot. At the time Marlon Brando was having an affair with one of the waiters, Jacques Viale. Vadim and Marquand overheard Brando muttering in English and introduced themselves. They knew nothing of Brando’s recent success on Broadway, taking him for an out of work actor bumming around Paris. When Brando mentioned that he was suffering in an uncomfortable fleabag of a hotel, Vadim and Marquand invited Brando to come live with them, and all three became intimately acquainted. In fact the normally heterosexual Marquand soon became besotted with Brando. Christian Marquand became best known to English-speaking audiences in Lord Jim (1965) and Apocalypse Now (1979). Marlon introduced his new friends to his waiter friend, Jacques Viale, who joined their circle. Viale later said that his time with Brando and his friends was the greatest moment of his life. “It was all downhill after Brando.”


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