Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
French film director; known for relationships with Bardot, Deneuve, and Fonda; made over 20 films, wrote a novel and autobiographies.
On the island
Eight records
I've chosen that because it's maybe the first piece of piano music I ever heard. My father was a very, very good pianist.
I was mentioning classical music that my stepfather introduced me to, and it's uh one of the little piece in a very long piece called Matthew's Passion by Johan Sebastian Bach.
I decided to use some jazz music for the musical score, and I chose MGQ who did improvise the music on the film that I was screening for them.
Nobody can go through this period without remembering the Beatles, and I'm like a lot of people. person who loves the Beatles
Richard Stross, and it's sung by Jesse Norman, I like voices, and that is one of the most extraordinary voices we have.
It's by Brian Ferry and it's called, maybe a little joke on my side, Slave to Love.
We are talking about children, then that brings us of course to relation between father and children, and I chose a very, very nice song of Judy Collin called My Father.
Non, je ne regrette rienFavourite
Then uh maybe it will be a good conclusion to our conversation if we listen to Edith Piaf the song is No, I Regret Nothing in French.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:00What sort of a background did you come from?
My father was born in Russia, in Kiev, and left during the revolution, became a French citizen and French uh diplomat, he was a French consul. Then we were living out of France uh in Egypt, in Turkey, was going to be named uh in post at Jerusalem when during a summer in France I was very young and he was only thirty four he died suddenly from a heart attack.
Presenter asks
4:35How dangerous a time was it for the family [during the German occupation]?
It was the place where a lot of uh underground activity were going. It was the French Alps. Not only because people were hiding there, but also because it was a good place to escape France through the Swiss border. Actually, uh we had at several times people hiding at our place. And uh I did help them. When they were chased by the Germans, to uh go through a pass called Col de Cou, uh through the border into Switzerland.
Presenter asks
10:12Why did you not do national service?
I had managed not to go directly in the army, but to go in a military hospital. You stay there a few weeks, a few months, and they decide if your health is good enough to be sent away. ... I discover driving to the military hospital that it's a strike in Paris. ... I arrived at the hospital and I learned that the Major, the doctor in charge of the military hospital, just came back from Indochina. had a young wife, And was very, very upset because he had to spend his night in the hospital instead of spending his night in his wife's bed. Then I l let the rumor go in the hospital that a car was in front of the place. Of course, ten minutes after, the major called me and said, Well, you know, I heard you have a car there. I said, Yes. And he said, Do you want me to drive you to your place tonight? ... Then I went with him through Paris. He slept with his wife. He was very pleased. The next morning I took him uh and brought it back to the hospital. ... And after that, I never slept at the hospital, I just went back with my uh new friend, the the majeur.
The keepsakes
The book
Louis-Ferdinand Céline
First, it's a great book, but it's one of the books who show in the most terrible way the misery of being a human being in a certain society. Then if I'm alone in an island, I don't want to regret what is happening on the rest of the continents.
Presenter asks
14:59Why did [And God Created Woman] create so much moral outrage and controversy at the time?
The character that I created for Brigitte Bardot was a young woman who had absolutely no shame of her body, no sense of guilt about feeling uh sexual attraction for men. And Brigitte was doing that with such a delicious but irreverent way. That it becomes difficult for people to accept it. ... The second level is more personal. It's because I was married to Bridget Bardot. And I did some naked scene and love scene on the set. And people at this time saw that that was very scandalous.
Presenter asks
24:43Does it ever get confusing who belongs to who [with four children by four different women]?
Yes, specifically for someone who has sometimes tendency to be absent-minded, right? ... I was going to start a movie for MGM, then send back the children to their mother. And Jane Fonda was in London, Catherine Deneuve in Paris, and Annette Stroburg, the mother of my oldest daughter, in Rome. ... The name of the children was just written Children Vadim with a letter. ... I'm paged and I go to Air France and say, What happened? ... I had sent the wrong child to the wrong mother. Not one were going to see the right mother. Christian to Rome, Rome, etc. I spent my whole evening calling the mother and said, sorry, but you are not going to get the one you expect.
“In a situation like that, you really discover who people are. You see some old man who seems like he will never do anything in his life and he he becomes so courageous he's killed instead of giving away some names. You see some uh generals who always talk about uh their country and uh morality and uh then they will uh do anything to make money or to give away the name of some Jewish people because they don't like them.”
“I've discover that sometime in life if you really want to do something, it does happen.”
“when a woman write a book of memoir and a lot did about her ex husband or ex lovers, It's considered as very charming ... If it's a man, It's a lack of chivalry, it's not gallant. And really I don't see why. If it has to be different two ways, then I want to have the possibility to be like men were half a century ago.”