“The queen of the night, the Grande Zoa, the Fréhel de Montparnasse, she had a thousand nicknames, but we only called her by her first name.“, wrote Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte in a text tribute to Régine, unveiled by the Elysée Palace. The presidential couple is not the only one to have greeted the queen of the night, a nickname that stuck to her skin. .
Solicited by Paris Match for a portrait of the late Régine, who died on May 1 at the age of 92, the author Gilles Lhote recounts the meeting between the star and a screenwriter who came to discuss at her home in 2018, in Paris, a series project on her life. While the screenwriter tries somehow to redo the chronology of the one who was patron of more than twenty establishments, he has the misfortune to qualify her as queen of the night. But, this nickname anchored with the general public, Régine does not like it! “She cuts, sharply, the titi accent as a banner: ‘Queen of the night, it’s corny! Anyway, the night no longer exists in Paris. It became infinitely sad.’“However, during her career as a singer Régine had fun with this nickname, thus singing the title queen of the night in 1983 after a collaboration for the piece with Jacques Morali, Fred Zarr and Didier Barbelivien.
But then, what did Régine prefer? “Among all her nicknames, she preferred that of Mademoiselle, rock and chic, light as her crazy evenings“, relates Paris Match. During her long career she rubbed shoulders with all the cream of show business, she also had acquired the nickname Minou given to him by his great friend Françoise Sagan. And, from her career as a singer to whom we owe in particular I will Survive and The little papers, Régine had also made a nickname for herself in the United States. “The Americans nicknamed her Happy Piaf, for her happier repertoire than that of the great Edith“, adds the magazine. Moreover, America had not forgotten her since Régine was entitled to a photo and the announcement of her death on the cover of the prestigious New York Times !
Note that Régine’s funeral will be held on May 9 in Paris.