Celine Dion once spun on the highway while returning from filming Flowers on the snow. Her wedding cake cost $10,000, and “to pass someone a tree” means “to rip them off.” Here is some of the information found in Tell me Celinea new unofficial biography, the delivery of which has sparked controversy.
This biography was particularly awaited, since at the start of 2023, Hachette Canada, distributor of City Éditions in Quebec, promised confidences from Céline Dion collected over “several months” by Laurence Catinot-Crost, a French writer from Juvisy- sur-Orge, in the suburbs of Paris. The information circulated until the European publisher published a press release last August including “certain major details”. He confirmed that it was an “unauthorized work” which had “not been created or written” in collaboration with the Quebec artist.
Reached by email, the author Laurence Catinot-Crost indicates that she “never claimed to have collected the confidences of Madame Céline Dion”. And yet, she seems to affirm the opposite in an interview given to the French media group La Dépêche last February. “The blunders committed by some cannot be attributed to me,” she replies.
Smooth arrival
Tell me Celine quietly arrives in Quebec. Without fanfare. It’s the least we can say. Hachette Canada was never able to provide a physical or PDF copy of the book to journalists. Head of the company’s press service, Fabienne Corriveau specifies that the work is only offered “on order”. In other words, your favorite bookseller won’t carry “tons of copies,” as a defunct VHS rental chain said at the turn of the century.
By email, Laurence Catinot-Crost insists that she wrote this biography “with the greatest respect for the artist”, while specifying that she had worked with “rigor”, favoring “historical truth”. The 64-year-old writer reports having “devoted two years of research” to writing the work.
After having gone through the 577 pages (in electronic version) of Tell me Celine, we understand, by consulting the bibliographical references, grouped at the very last part, where the numerous orphan quotes from Céline Dion, René Angélil, Maman Dion and company, scattered throughout the chapters, come from. In total, the author relied on 42 works, published on both sides of the Atlantic, signed by Denise Bombardier, Claudette Dion, Jean Beaunoyer and several others.
Since all the information contained in Tell me Celine comes from biographies, collections and newspaper articles already published, super fans of the performer will not learn much new by leafing through this book. But that does not prevent it from being rich in information, which is listed in chronological order, like a long Wikipedia entry, from the very beginnings of Charlemagne to the protocol of special care that she followed since last winter in Minnesota to alleviate his neurological disorder.
In detail
Laurence Catinot-Crost’s style is certainly clear, but the author sometimes errs on the side of too much detail. When she mentions a Céline Dion appearance on the TV show Silence… we sing, in August 1986, she lists each of the songs she offers in medley. When she talks about her 1991 Diet Coke ad with Obelix and Dogmatix, she transcribes her jingle entire, vocal acrobatics included: “It’s crazy how it quenches your thirst, it’s crazy how popular it is… But above all, but before everything-tou-tou-tou-tou-tou-tou…” And when she recalls her wedding in Montreal in December 1994, she copied the complete menu, which included – note to the curious – “ravioles with Brome duck confit and sorrel velouté”, as well as a “small salmon tartare and thin strips smoked with five peppers and caviar quenelle”.
Did we need so much detail? Maybe not. But on the other hand, this escalation of information allows us to learn that Céline Dion needed 12 hours of sleep at the start of her career, that she was once the mistress of a cat named Isis, and that after cutting her hair short in 1993, she wore a wig for a few months to avoid upsetting her audience, who loved her long mane.
Another anecdote worth mentioning: during a private concert at Mar-a-Lago in 1996, Donald Trump presented her as one of the greatest talents in the United States. Like what, the spins of the former President of the United States are not new.
As for the spin she made by car in 1990, after trying to overtake René Angélil’s nephew, she escaped unscathed. However, the same cannot be said of his car, which was “very damaged”, apparently.
Intended for the French public
Tell me Celine risks annoying Quebec readers on a few points, notably when its author deviates from the story (Céline Dion begins her tour Incognito in Rouyn-Noranda) to recall the little history of Abitibi-Témiscamingue, a “huge region of Canada, sparsely populated, with numerous lakes”, “theater of commercial rivalries” and “first French fur trading post, established in 1720”. The Laurentians undergo the same treatment, a few pages later.
The French public will undoubtedly welcome this additional information with more enthusiasm.
Footnotes should also cause eye rolls in Quebec, more specifically those that explain each local expression. Thus, we emphasize that “to butter thickly” means “to exaggerate, to do too much”, that “to work hard en titi” means “a lot, in large quantities”, that “to fart at the fret” means “to die, to fall from exhaustion” , that “to have eyes in grease of bines” means “to get up tired”, and that a “tune” is synonymous with “song”.
A word about the preface to the book Tell me Celine : it is signed by the French singer-songwriter Hugues Aufray, since the Las Vegas diva is named after her great success of 1966, Celine.
Tell me Celine
City Éditions, distributed in Quebec by Hachette Canada