The daughter of a loyalist politician and diplomat, she volunteered as a nurse during the Spanish Civil War and after Franco's victory sought asylum in France. After studying acting at the Paris Conservatoire, she began appearing on the stage in the early 40s and made her screen debut in Carné's Les Enfants du Paradis / Children of Paradise. A superb stage tragedienne with the Comédie Française amd later with the Théâtre National Populaire, she dominated the screen with her dark beauty and powerful personality in sporadic film appearances. Memorable as Death in Cocteau's Orphée / Orpheus.