In Jean Roy and Jean-Pierre Pedrazzini, these two photographers from Paris Match who died almost at the same time.

Jean Roy was an adventurer, a rough-and-tumble guy who took pictures everywhere in the world, from Guatemala to Hollywood. He went to Egypt with the famous american photographer David Seymour who was one of the founder in 1947 with Capa, Bresson and Rodger of the Magnum agency. Jean Roy went to Egypt to cover the Suez Canal's war in 1956, he took a Jeep that he named BAL0024 for Balzac and drove into the "no man's land" near El Kantara without protection. He died with Seymour under the egyptian's machine guns.

    

Jean-Pierre Pedrazzini was called "The Angel". He really wanted to be a war photographer. So he went to Budapest to cover the insurrection against the soviets in 1956. He knew well the east of Europe and took impressive pictures but he didn't have any experiences of that kind of "war situation". He was shot on the field and died a few days after in the hospital in front of his last pictures.

In the french popular magasine Paris Match, a long time ago.

Jean Prouvost was the founder of the magasine. He was a very rich man who decided to revolutionize the french press with crazy methods. 

He decided to employ young and fearless photographers and treat them like stars to allow them catching incredible pictures. Working at Paris Match between the 50" and the 70" was maybe the coolest job in the world.

During the job interview, Prouvost always asked the same thing:

"Do you enjoy life?"

And if you came in his office to ask him money to buy a sport cars to be faster for a scoop or seduce a beautiful star in town, the answer was always "yes" in the next five minutes.

The office of Paris Match seemed more like a sport cars garage than a serious press empire.

All the photographers were kind of stylished playboys very recognizable that Prouvost called his "luxury gangsters".

The boss only gave one order before his photographers leave : 

To come back with the best picture.

Mercedes, cigars and first class tickets, not really the way of life of today's journalists.

All these "luxurious gangsters" loved to dance and seduce women at Castel every nights.

One of them was named Roger Vadim and picked up Brigitte Bardot. Not bad.

Here is the guys who have beaten Marlon Brando's bodyguard to avenge one of the photograph of the crew who had some problems with him. They completely broke the bar of the Café de Flore but Prouvost paid everything without saying a word.

(I really recommend you to watch this summer in France the tv show about Paris Match named "L'album des Français").