Author: THE HOBBLEDEHOY

Michael Stevenson, aka Dai Bando, Johnny Foreigner, Monsieur Pas De Merde, is a blogger of French and British culture. His blogs "Pas De Merde" and "The Hobbledehoy" have been called "marvelous" by some, and "meh" by others.

‘Call My Agent!’: Camille Cottin on Portraying Paris Without the Clichés

The final season of the hit French show is now on Netflix.

BY LALE ARIKOGLU

If there’s been one unexpected hit during a time when our main activity is Netflix and, well, more Netflix, it’s Call My Agent!

The French television show set at a Parisian talent agency has been a lighthearted salve thanks to its razor sharp depictions of the relationships between stars and their agents—not to mention the added charm of Paris as its backdrop. It’s fourth and final season is now available to stream here in the U.S. and comes complete with cameos from big names like Charlotte Gainsbourg and Sigourney Weaver, as well as the usual competitive antics we’ve come to expect from its beloved cast. We caught up with Camille Cottin, who plays the incomparable Andréa Martel, to talk about the challenges her character faces, Parisian clichés, and what she has missed most about the city during lockdown.

The show launched in France in 2015 but it really only landed on most American’s radars this past year. How do you think it’s been received by the different audiences?

It’s difficult to have popular and critical success at the same time, but that is what happened in France, and it’s funny to see all this interest starting again now. I just read an article in the New York Times saying that what makes the show interesting is [the way] it talks about the industry. Previously, the industry was always shown as cynical, and this is a tender show. There’s humor, there’s satire, we make fun of the people we’re depicting, but at the same time, there’s love, big love for cinema, big love for actors, big love for the people of the industry.

The producers [told me] they were quite surprised that it had an international echo, though, because it only talks about French actors. But it really depicts a star: the selfie star, or the nervous star, or the jealous star. Plus, the [agency] is like a family, they are all figures with whom you can identify with—and their [dynamics] of power, competition, and jealousy. The problems they deal with are human ones.

Paris, of course, is the backdrop to those relationships. What have been some of your favorite locations to film in?

Well, I loved the flat they gave [Andréa], which is twice the size of mine! But one true favorite is the scene at the end of season one: [My character] just got dumped and I feel lonely and sad, walking along that very famous bridge,

Continue reading “‘Call My Agent!’: Camille Cottin on Portraying Paris Without the Clichés” →

Paris’s Musée d’Orsay, from a train station to a world-class museum

Paris’s Musée d’Orsay, from a train station to a world-class museum

The Musée d’Orsay is the second most-visited museum in France after the Louvre. In 1986, this former Paris train station became a showcase for Impressionist art. The exhibition rooms are constantly evolving because only half the paintings are on display at any one time; the others are kept in the storeroom. Curators regularly renew the exhibits. Sometimes, the masterpieces require the expert care of restorers, who then have the delicate mission of bringing the paintings back to life. We take a closer look.

Liliane Rovère (Call My Agent!): The day Chet Baker’s wife pointed her with a gun

On the occasion of the release of her book, La folle vie de Lili , Liliane Rovère revealed a funny anecdote about her relationship with Chet Baker in the columns of the Parisian .

Liliane Rovère lived “an eventful life” . She tells her story in her autobiography, La folle vie de Lili , published by Robert Laffont on Thursday, April 11. For the occasion, the one who plays Arlette in Dix Pour Cent has agreed to return to a few passages from her book, in the columns of the Parisian .

The 86-year-old actress took the opportunity to reveal an astonishing anecdote about her past relationship with Chet Baker. In the 1950s, while living in New York, the aspiring actress had a mad passion with the illustrious jazz trumpeter, whom she met in a bar. “Love at first sight was for him, I let myself be carried by the flow, passive and delighted at the same time. He was a handsome boy (…) teenage style, a little thug,” she explains. Handsome boy, yes, but above all married. Very jealous, his wife even comes to point at Liliane Rover with a revolver: “I must have smiled stupidly, telling me that she was not going to shoot, I was not afraid, and at the same time …” .

As the daily relates, she ultimately did not shoot. But Chet Baker preferred to divorce him to join his beautiful, that he even takes with him on tour. However, this love story is far from idyllic for the young woman. “We hardly knew each other. We made love a lot, but without complicity,” she adds. Two years after their meeting, their relationship ends. Today she no longer idealizes him and thinks of him “with affection, and a little sadness too” , she confides. “It was excessive and was to the end,” she concludes. Chet Baker died in 1988, aged just 58, after falling out of a window in his room on the second floor of a hotel.

Google translation from Femmeactuelle: Liliane Rovère (Ten percent): the day Chet Baker’s wife pointed her with a gun: Femme Actuelle Le MAG