Club illico’s new dramatic comedy “About Antoine” is touching, funny and luminous, the story it tells revolving around an atypical family filled with love.
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• Read also: Available from January 19 on Club illico: unveiling of the trailer for the “About Antoine” series
Screenwriter Cathleen Rouleau, for whom this is the first TV series and who is defending her first major role in it, is inspired by her own experience to stage the arrival of Julie, her character, in the life of Marc Fenouillard. (Claude Legault), who in fact camps Sylvain Parent-Bédard, the big boss of ComediHa!, in Quebec.
Always on the phone, Marc has two children, Georges (Edouard-B. Larocque) and Antoine (Antoine Parent-Bédard), 15, who plays his own role for the sake of authenticity. Polyhandicapped, Antoine is autistic level 3, intellectually disabled, non-verbal and epileptic high level.
In the first scene, which Julie interrupts to address the viewers directly, thus breaking the fourth wall, she recounts the beginnings of her relationship with Marc as she prepares to experience her family baptism with the Fenouillards.
We feel that the young woman, actress in life, is full of doubts. Challenges abound for her, who leaves Montreal to live her great love in Quebec. And it’s the commotion that awaits him, all the members of the clan not taking long to parade through Marc’s condo, namely his mother Margot (excellent Micheline Bernard), his ex Justine (Fanny Mallette) as well as his two brothers, Patrick (Sylvain Marcel) and Philippe (Hugues Frenette). And, let’s face it, everyone has a strong personality, which creates funny situations.
“[Julie] gets a little picked up by it all, ”admitted Cathleen Rouleau on the sidelines of the viewing of the first four episodes, Wednesday.
The young woman’s clumsiness does not prevent her from quickly becoming attached to Antoine, and vice versa. The scene concluding the first episode also tears us away.
Watching the series, one wonders what is true and what has been fictionalized in the narrative. Both Cathleen Rouleau and Sylvain Parent-Bédard affirm that the majority of the situations are true, including the segments having been improvised.
Podz is in good shape
Podz’s camera – who wanted “Antoine to have a good time” during the process – is still so creative and fired up. His signature is there, especially through short sequence shots, and he even allows you to see Antoine’s point of view on occasion.
The director of “19-2”, of “Mafia inc.” and “Lupin” says he learned a lot on the set, in Quebec, in particular to be more “transparent” as to his intentions, he who is not the most talkative. And without his baggage, he would never have been able, according to him, to box the 10 episodes “without stressing”, so much had to be adapted over the 45 days of filming.
The days were indeed modulated according to the good or bad times of Antoine. The experience was beneficial to him, as the teen’s brain was stimulated to the point where the frequency of his epileptic seizures decreased.
A second season is in development at ComediHa! and Quebecor Content, but while waiting for it, Club illico subscribers will be able to put on the first version starting Thursday, January 19.