Gad Elmaleh (born April 19, 1971 in Casablanca, Morocco) is a Moroccan-Canadian-French comedian, actor, singer and voice actor.
Born in a Berber Jewish Moroccan family, he moved to Montreal in Quebec in 1988, then to France in 1992. After following acting lessons at the Cours Florent under the tutelage of Isabelle Nanty and serving as assistant to comedian Élie Kakou, he struck fame at the Turn of the Millennium with stage personas such as the Drag Queen Chouchou and the Nouveau Riche Coco and stand-up comedy shows such as La Vie normale. He also provides the singing in his shows whenever it occurs.
He ventured for the first time in the film industry in 1996, then rose to eventually adapt the aforementioned characters of Chouchou and Coco on film, in 2003 and 2009 respectively. While he's played mostly comedic roles (such as La Vérité si je mens! 2, Chouchou, Coco and Francis Veber's La Doublure), he's also had a major case of Playing Against Type with his role as a greedy and ruthless banker in Le Capital in 2012, directed by Costa-Gavras.
He's had the occasional voice roles too, such as Raoul in A Monster in Paris and the French dub of Gru in the Despicable Me franchise.
He's dated Charlotte Casiraghi (the daughter of Princess Caroline of Monaco) from 2011 to 2015 and a son was born of the relation, Raphaël Elmaleh. He converted to Catholicism in 2022.
Selected works:
Live-Action:
- La Vérité si je mens! 2 (2001) as Dov Mimran
- Chouchou (2003) as Choukri aka "Chouchou"
- The 11 Commandments (2004) as himself
- La Doublure (2005) as François Pignon
- Coco (2009) as Coco
- Jack and Jill (2011) as Chef Xavier
- Midnight in Paris (2011) as Detective Tisserant
- Le Capital (2012) as Marc Tourneuil
- The Dictator (2012) as a protestor
- Mood Indigo (2013) as Chick
- Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee (2013) as himself
- Huge en France (2019) as himself
Voice acting:
- Dr. Dolittle 2 (2001) as Archie
- Bee Movie (2007) as Barry B. Benson (French dub)
- Despicable Me as Felonius Gru (French dub)
- Despicable Me (2010)
- Despicable Me 2 (2013)
- Minions (2015)
- Despicable Me 3 (2017)
- Minions: The Rise of Gru (2022)
- Despicable Me 4 (2024)
- A Monster in Paris (2011) as Raoul
- The Adventures of Tintin (2011) as Omar Ben Salaad (English and French versions)
