This Wednesday, April 20, 2022, Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen are face to face from 9 p.m. for the famous debate between two presidential rounds. The first, leader of La République en Marche, came first in the first round with 27.6% of the vote, while the leader of the National Rally obtained 23.41% of the vote. At the animation of this political show broadcast on TF1 and France 2, but also BFMTV, CNEWS, LCI and franceinfo, stand out Léa Salamé and Gilles Bouleau, after the controversy linked to the name of Anne-Sophie Lapix. The two journalists were guests of The Moment M on France Inter on April 19 and delivered their confidences before this particular interview.
During this debate during which the speakers know the themes addressed, but not the exact questions, the staging is of great importance. “It’s not a play but there is a dramaturgy“, explains Gilles Bouleau to Sonia Devillers. The presenter of 8 p.m. of TF1 uses the metaphor of sport to describe the debate: “They will be alone, faced with their limits, their talent, their flaws.“
It was then that his colleague bounced back on the subject: “I give you a little scoop, they are going to be even more alone than in the other televised debates because there is a televised bias that has been decided and we find Gilles and I interesting. We will see what it gives. A choice of scenography which is that we don’t have, unlike other debates, a table in the middle, the two of us side by side and them on the right and on the left. We journalists are clearly in the background. This bias has never been made yet in France. (…) The idea is to put them face to face.“
Wouldn’t that be very risky “to isolate” the two politicians, like in 2017 when journalists declared that they had failed to channel them and catch their eyes? For Gilles Bouleau, this staging had succeeded well in the presidential debate led by Chris Wallace against Joe Biden and Donald Trump: “He did a work of authority when he was 7 or 8 meters away, in a kind of orchestra pit.“
From 2017 to 2022
Five years later, Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel Macron find themselves in front of the cameras to defend their ideas. About 16.5 million viewers attended their clash in 2017. Nathalie Saint-Cricq, political columnist at France Télévisions, then co-presented this face-to-face with Christophe Jakubyszyn. For the journalist who confided in the Parisian, “except for a twist, like a candidate who breaks down, it only plays on the margins. It may be very tight in the end, but I don’t think Emmanuel Macron can crumble and Marine Le Pen wins all of a sudden, even though she’s been more prepared for this debate than the first time in 2017. “. Outgoing President Emmanuel Macron is credited with 56.5% voting intentions in the second round against 43.5% for Marine Le Pen according to the daily Ipsos-Sopra Steria survey for franceinfo and Le Parisien-Today in France. The margin of error is 3.3 points.