Director and graphic novelist Marjane Satrapi dies

French-Iranian film director, animator and graphic novelist Marjane Satrapi has died at the age of 56.

The Persepolis and Radioactive director "died of sadness" following the death of her husband Mattias Ripa in April 2025.

"Marjane Satrapi died of sadness a little over a year after the death of Mattias Ripa, her husband and the love of her life," members of her family said in a statement to AFP on Thursday.

Satrapi, who had lived in France since the 1990s, gained notice in the film world with her 2007 animation Persepolis, an adaptation of her autobiographical graphic novel, which followed a young girl as she came of age against the backdrop of the Iranian Revolution.

The film was both a commercial and a critical success, winning Best First Film at France's César Awards and scoring an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature, making Satrapi the first woman to receive a nod in that category.

She followed it up with 2011's Chicken with Plums, a live-action adaptation of her graphic novel of the same name, and the 2012 crime comedy La bande des Jotas.

Satrapi then started to work in Hollywood, beginning with the 2014 horror-comedy The Voices, starring Ryan Reynolds, Anna Kendrick, and Gemma Arterton. After that, she directed Rosamund Pike in the 2020 Marie Curie biopic Radioactive and Monica Bellucci in the 2024 French black comedy Dear Paris.

In addition to Persepolis, which was published in four volumes, Satrapi's literary works also included Monsters Are Afraid of the Moon, Woman, Life, Freedom, The Sigh and the aforementioned Chicken with Plums.

The multi-talented artist, who became a French citizen in 2006, declined the country's highest official honour, the Légion d'honneur, in 2025 over certain policies, such as its visa policies for Iranians.