Born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, Pascale Bussières first attracted attention as a suicidal teenager in Micheline Lanctôt’s 1984 film Sonatine; however, it was Blanche, the 1993 Radio-Canada series directed by Charles Binamé that gave her star status in Quebec. After Blanche, and then a lead in Binamé’s Generation-X picture Eldorado, Bussières became the 1990s heir to Geneviève Bujold and Carole Laure – the most charismatic Actress of her generation. It’s a measure of Bussières’s range as an Actress that her follow-up to Eldorado was the role of a prim-and-proper theology student who discovers her lesbian desires in Patricia Rozema's When Night Is Falling. She also gives a standout performance as an alienated fashion model who wants to conceive a child in Denis Villeneuve's debut feature, August 32nd on Earth (Un 32 août sur terre), and won both the 2004 Best Actress Prix Jutra and Genie Award for her dramatic impersonation of Quebec singing star Alys Robi in Bittersweet Memories (Ma vie en cinemascope).
