Philipp Lawrence Durand

Height: 183 cm

Actor Philippe (Lawrence) Durand was born Philippe Gilbert Durand. His mother, Lucienne, was a ballerina and his father, Roger, a tenor who began his singing career as a baritone. When Philippe was bo ...Show More

Actor Philippe (Lawrence) Durand was born Philippe Gilbert Durand. His mother, Lucienne, was a ballerina and his father, Roger, a tenor who began his singing career as a baritone. When Philippe was born, his parents were traveling a lot and needed more stability. His mother then worked for a firm overseas as the director's main secretary and his dad became an artist chief baker working with personalities. Philippe was always grateful to his parents for giving him a beautiful childhood and for always being supportive. They encouraged Philippe to practice arts and sports from the very start. Philippe's parents believed in the saying "A sound mind in a healthy body". Raised in the South of France,the only child Philippe Durand started his career with the Alphabet Theater, a reputable independent theater company in Nice, in the play entitled "Dieu aboie-t-il?" by Francois Boyer. Encouraged by the reviews, Philippe pursued acting, mostly stage, playing the leading men in "The School Of Wives", "Don Juan" and "The Misanthrope" among others. Philippe got his first theatrical roles with the studio Of the Victorine: "Ombres", "Heidi", an appearance in "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" with Michael Caine and Steve Martin, and "Monte-Carlo" with Joan Collins. But it was on stage, at the National Theater of Nice directed at the time by Jacques Weber, that Philippe caught the attention of the producers and agents with the lead role of the tormented and versatile soldier in love, Woyzeck, in "Woyzeck" by Georg Buchner. Philippe won a critic Award for the role (1994). Philippe is also a singer-songwriter and at a very young age played piano at the well-known Conservatory of Nice He won many prizes from age five to eighteen before starting an acting career a few years later. Philippe began competing in sports at an early age and is an accomplished athlete. He won competitions in skiing, swimming, tennis, and soccer. Since said competitions Philippe has continued to practice sports on a regular basis. It was in Paris that Philippe started to write and to direct while pursuing his acting career. With four shorts (two award-winning in European festivals), three full scripts and his credits as an actor under his belt, Philippe arrived in Los Angeles. He bought an old American car at first and was working hard on his English pronunciation while being stuck in LA traffic. He practiced constantly that way. He soon appeared in a series of guest-starring roles: "USA High" (1998), "Seven Stages", the co-lead in the independent film "Pinter", and the lead in another independent film "The Islander". He then booked a guest-starring role in the Emmy Award-winning show, "Frasier" (2001), played the role of a mean French lover in the feature film "Not Entirely Awake" (2002), booked the co-lead in the French-English-Italian feature "Two Lonely Friends" (2003), and a challenging co-starring role in "American Dreams" (2004), playing the French Mercenaire, Rene, who gives JJ (played by Will Estes) a hard time. He also played on stage the role of Valmont in "Dangerous Liaisons" by Laclos. Philippe has been seen in a feature film with Christopher Walken entitled "Balls of Fury"(Focus Pictures/Universal)(2007). He went to Brazil to play the role of the race car pilot Symington in "Bluecross". He played on stage Jean-Pierre, the French lover of an American girl named Emma, in a love triangle story entitled "The Innocent Love of a Butterfly". This play was originally a screenplay that will be soon made into a feature film. He passed successfully his first audition at the Actors Studio with a scene from Fool For Love by Sam Sheppard, playing the role of Eddie, a cowboy. For a Frenchman, that was already an accomplishment. Something that will help him later on. Meanwhile Philippe has been pursuing his writing and directing career in the US and in Europe. Philippe's first American movie as a writer-director, "Black and Blue"(2005-2006), was a touching story about missing children. "Black and Blue" received acclaims from associations for the missing children. One of the main projects that brought Philippe to the US has been a thriller entitled "The Man in the Green Hat" and before a feature film drama entitled "The Devil Never Sleeps", by director Ralph Server, winner of the 2004 New York Independent Film Festival with the film "Without Mercy". Philippe has been approached by the writer-director of this film to play the lead role in this drama, in the style of "Ocean 11". This role went to Alain Delon 15 years ago before the sudden death of one of the producers, Boris Sagal, that stopped the production of the film at that time. But the film to be directed by Ralph Server was never made. Philippe's fascination for westerns took an unexpected turn when a group of producers brought him a new project, a western. Philippe played an interesting role in it: a man who have a hard time to speak but can draw very fast. The film called "Mysterious Rider" was never released. Philippe's disappointment was short as another opportunity came along: to make a western in Arizona with a group of producers interested in Philipp's own script, a unique western entitled "The French Cowboy". From that moment on, other opportunities came along and Philippe has now a series of films in development and in preparation with independent companies and studios. Including a love story drama, a family adventure drama, a WWII movie, a western... Philipp's love and insatiable appetite for writing, acting, producing, and directing brought him many exciting and new opportunities as his own production company keeps growing. His schedule is busy until 2018. On a personal level, Philippe has been engaged 4 times. His third engagement sadly ended at the end of the year 2009 after 3 years. Although Philippe likes to say that being engaged to a girl with all the qualities a man desires and who was not in the same business was exciting and refreshing. Finally in 2014 Philippe married a beautiful and talented young doctor met in Florida. Hide