Marianne Faithfull, the singer and actor who became an icon of London’s music scene in the 1960s, has died, BBC News and The New York Times report. “Marianne passed away peacefully in London today, in the company of her loving family,” a statement read. “She will be dearly missed.” No cause of death was given. She was 78 years old.
Faithfull’s music career took off in 1965 with the single “As Tears Go By,” the first song Mick Jagger and Keith Richards ever wrote, after the Rolling Stones’ manager plucked her off the street. She fast became a star, releasing a string of folk-pop records that complemented the gnarlier sounds of the British invasion and made her doe-eyed look a symbol of the era. She also inspired many of Jagger’s classic Rolling Stones songs, including “Wild Horses” and “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.”
Faithfull and Jagger’s affair catapulted Faithfull into the public eye, bringing sustained interest in her personal life and some devastating side effects. In the ensuing decade, her music career stalled as she grappled with substance use, anorexia, and homelessness. But after returning with a pair of albums—1976’s Dreamin’ My Dreams and, three years later, the Grammy-nominated Broken English—she was celebrated as an all-timer. The latter album, which chronicles the emotional and psychological struggles of the preceding decade, caused a sensation, earning enduring acclaim and plaudits from the likes of PJ Harvey and Nick Cave.
In tandem with music, Faithfull worked as an actress for most of her life, appearing in multiple movies and in a handful of stage productions in England. Her onscreen acting credits began with Jean-Luc Godard’s Made in U.S.A., in which she played herself, and extended to include Jack Cardiff’s The Girl on a Motorcycle, Tony Richardson’s Hamlet, and Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette. One of her final film appearances was a voice acting role in Denis Villeneuve’s Dune.
Faithfull continued to release music throughout her later years, shifting toward a gentler, smoother sound with age. In 2008, she collaborated with ANOHNI, Jarvis Cocker, and Cat Power on the album Easy Come Easy Go, which featured covers of songs by Brian Eno, the Decemberists, Neko Case, Morrissey, and others. The 2014 album Give My Love to London and 2018’s Negative Capability followed. (Both of those albums featured duets with Nick Cave.)
In recent years, Faithfull and her body of work have caught a retrospective eye; Broken English was given a deluxe reissue in 2013, and a biopic, directed by Ian Bonhôte and starring Lucy Boynton as Faithfull, has been in the works for several years. In April 2020, Faithfull was hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19 and received treatment for pneumonia. Following three weeks of recovery, she was discharged from the hospital.
