Yul Brynner: Eye Witness

Immortalized as the striking sovereign in The King and I, Yul Brynner is among a handful of thespians to truly earn the title of Hollywood royalty. Last year the actor’s offscreen talent for photography was revealed when his daughter Victoria launched Yul Brynner: A Photographic Journey, a four-tome box set including behind-the-scenes images of silverscreen epics such as The Ten Commandments, as well as candid portraits of Audrey Hepburn, Ingrid Bergman and Elizabeth Taylor. It was Brynner’s friendships with Magnum photographers Ernst Haas and Inge Morath that first ignited his passion with the medium, which developed into a skill he would fine-tune over the next five decades. “The camera was an extension of his hand,” Victoria says. "He was such an imposing and striking-looking man, yet he managed to make people feel a level of trust to the extent that they didn’t pay attention to him at all.” An exhibition of Brynner’s works will be staged at the Musée de l'Elysée in Lausanne next year.