Every day, a personality invites itself into the world of Élodie Suigo. Friday November 17, 2023: the actor and director, Gérard Jugnot, is starring in Christophe Barratier’s new film “Comme parmagique”.
Gérard Jugnot wears several hats: actor, director, screenwriter and film producer. With his friends from the Splendid troupe, he managed to conquer the public with films that have become cult, such as The Bronzed (1978), Tanned people go skiing (1979) or even Santa Clause is garbage (1982). He is also a director of a different register, with social comedies like Pinot simple cop (1984), Scout always… (1985), A wonderful time… (1991).
Wednesday November 15, 2023, he is starring in the new film by Christophe Barratier As if by magic alongside Kev Adams. This film tells the story of Victor, a magician who is going to become a father. Life smiles on him until the day of childbirth, when everything changes because his wife dies giving birth to their daughter. He will therefore have to raise his daughter alone. But he can then count on the whimsical grandfather who will become his nanny and on Nina (Claire Chust), his best childhood friend, his confidante and life guide.
franceinfo: As if by magic highlights the illusion of our lives and confronts it with the reality of everyday life. So, should we live without illusions or with them?
Gérard Jugnot: It was Truffaut who said a rather terrible thing: If I had loved life, I would never have made films. I wouldn’t go that far, but it’s certain that I see cinema as life in a better way. We fix life, we get rid of everything that is not good and we put on a look of humor, of laughter, like in this film where there are still a lot of moments of laughter and so it fixes, it repairs.
“I believe that laughter is medicine, it’s vitamins.”
Gérard Jugnotat franceinfo
Indeed, you have always loved this cinema which ultimately highlighted “beauty” more than life. Why do you make cinema?
I made a film which was a huge failure, called Pink and Black (2009) and which was perhaps the most autobiographical film. Yes, I think I’m trying to put pink on the black of life. I’m trying to embellish it all. Maybe because I tend to be attracted to everything that’s wrong, to flaws. So I sometimes draw comedy from it, we can also draw evil from beauty and humanity.
How do you cope with the fact that over time you have become one of our family members?
Yes, it’s quite touching. I’m in a period of my life where I meet a lot of people who say to me: Thank you, I grew up with your films. It’s quite nice and above all, it’s quite rewarding because that hasn’t always been the case. A few years ago, there was an exhibition in Lille in homage to the Santa Claus is trash who celebrated his 40th birthday. They brought out costumes, sets, but also reviews from the time and that’s quite pleasant to read 40 years later. To see that people had written peremptory and extremely harsh things about us… I’m not into revenge, but it’s a little satisfaction!
What has changed the most over time? Between this moment when you met your high school friends who became your traveling companions and today?
Many things have changed. I’m not in the “it was better before” side. During this period of Splendid, we did lots of great things, we laughed a lot, but I still had a lot of worries. It’s not a very peaceful time in my life. We borrowed a lot of money to build two or three theaters. It had to work and it didn’t work right away! It worked relatively quickly so no complaints, but I was really worried. I think that from the age of 35-40, things went better because I was already a little more settled. I had a kid at 30 and I took care of him, but I also had to take care of my career a lot. What is also good in the film and which is very fair is the case of the character of Kev, who is torn between his daughter and the temptation to go towards what is simpler, what is more rewarding and more soothing.
Finally, are you happy with the journey you have already achieved, even if you still have plenty of things to do and certainly still plenty of desires?
“I really, really deeply love this job.”
Gérard Jugnotat franceinfo
Yes, I am happy. For us, it was our concern to remain the stars of the 1980s, with a guy who always sings the same song, I would have found that a little difficult. There, between all the films we made at Splendid, plus the ones I made personally… I’m happy that people are talking to me, Choirs (2004), from Santa Clausothers from Spoiled rotten (2021), it’s quite satisfying. Happy and a little proud to have managed to do all that. I’m even the first to be amazed! When people talk to me about all that, I say to myself: the number of things I’ve done, the number of hours I’ve spent on sets, on theater stages… Yes, I’ve been quite happy.
Watch this interview on video: