French actor Gaspard Ulliel dies at 37 after ski accident

PARIS (Reuters) -French actor Gaspard Ulliel, known for appearing in Chanel perfume ads and portraying fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent in a 2014 biopic, has died at 37 following a ski accident in the Alps, French media reported on Wednesday.

Ulliel, who won a French Cesar award in 2017 for best actor for his role in “It’s Only the End of the World,” a film by director Xavier Dolan, was the face of the Bleu de Chanel men’s fragrance.

“French cinema is losing a huge talent, full of charm and energy,” French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire posted on Twitter.

On Tuesday afternoon, Ulliel had collided with another skier on a blue ski trail, an intermediate slope, in the town of Montvalezan in eastern France, the prosecutor of nearby Albertville said in a statement.

She said Ulliel was unconscious after the collision and was taken by helicopter to a Grenoble hospital, where he died on Wednesday. The other skier was unharmed.

(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon and GV De Clercq; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Lisa Shumaker)