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Apr 21, 2008
1949 Paris : hot spots 2.
Idhec was created in 1942 by Régime de Vichy. One might have thought Pétain’s Etat français had more pressing matters at hand : evidence that, even in dire straits, the French take their cinema seriously or that, like its German mentor, Vichy saw cinema as its privileged propaganda weapon ?
Despite the school dubious pedigree, Alain Resnais joined its editing section as early as 1943. It would nevertheless take a few years for the Idhec influence on French cinema to be felt : Roger has to play the trumpet in jazz clubs to manage a little cash.
In 1949, a real life man nevertheless already combined the characters of Lucien and Roger.
Jean Rouch was still a student at prestigious Ecole des ponts et chaussées -an engineering school Lucien’s father no doubt dreamt of for his son-, when he released his first ethnographic film on Africa, « Au pays des mages noirs » (1947).
In 1949, came « Hombroï », then followed a full career devoted to Africa, film and ethnography. Jean Rouch died in 2002, in Niger, in a car accident.
Roger makes petty cash in Claude Luther’s orchestra : the real band existed until 2006 and its leader’s death.
Claude Luther’s orchestra used to play at Club Saint-Germain, a creation of (song-)writer and musician Boris Vian and a group of his friends, on rue Saint-Benoît.
Jazz had been censored during the war and Paris rediscovered it through US soldiers. Musicians appearing at the club included Duke Ellington, Sidney Bechet, Stéphane Grappelli, Claude Bolling and Miles Davis.
Michel Legrand, who would, in the 1960s, write the musical score for Jacques Demy’s « Les parapluies de Cherbourg » and « Les demoiselles de Rochefort », was a Club Saint-Germain regular, like, if the spacey composer is to be trusted, Alain Delon : the to-be actor ignored that, ten years later, he would kill Claude Luther’s on screen trumpet player, Maurice Ronet, in René Clément’s « Plein soleil ».
Maurice Ronet’s Roger was not the only aspiring filmmaker to like jazz : Louis Malle, also an Idhec graduate, would have Miles Davis compose the score for « Ascenseur pour l’échafaud » (1957). In 1963, with « Le feu follet », Louis Malle would also offer Maurice Ronet one of his more memorable roles.
The Left Bank theatre where Christine’s and Thérèse’s acting careers take off, was probably inspired by Théâtre de la Huchette, created in 1948, on the eponymous street, by George Vitaly, a director of Russian origin.
In 1950, Ionesco’s « La cantatrice chauve » will premiere there. Sartre’s « Les mains sales » had opened in 1948 at Théâtre Antoine, on the Right Bank.
Hyperactive during the post-war years, the Paris theatre scene had started to build momentum under German Occupation. Sartre’s « Huis clos » premiered in 1943, while Gérard Philipe was « discovered » in Jean Giraudoux’s « Sodome et Gomorrhe ».
In « Rendez-vous de juillet », Daniel Gélin’s Lucien had sentimental reasons to distrust the theatre community, and particularly directors.
The actor had no such bias, his brightest professional moments may have occurred on stage : in 1945, he played in a production of « Huis clos » ; in 1946, he starred in Jean Cocteau’s « Les parents terribles » under Louis Jouvet’s direction.
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