It is his last great success in cinemas and his last great first role. In 2023, after four years of absence, Michel White had made a return to the cinema in Small victories. In this dramatic comedy he signed Mélanie Auffret, embodies Emile, a septuagenarian illiterate who finds a taste for life and helps the mayor-instructor (Julia Piaton) of her people to do the same.
Despite the fall in cinemas after pandemic, Small victories He had triumphed in the theaters, with almost a million viewers. A success that now makes it one of Michel Blanc’s flagship films. The past spring, 4 million viewers also acclaimed him in France 2. Its director Mélanie Auffret tells us about her filming memories in our podcast Comedy Club.
Michel Blanc was in love with the project. “I had read the script at registration speed,” recalls the director. “Normally, you send the stage to the agents, then they give it to the actors or not and, sometimes, it can take weeks or even months before having an answer. There, we send it on April 2 at 11 am and 3 pm, Michel called me to tell me that I was doing it. It was crazy.”
“I am a fart with annotations”
To justify his emotion, Michel Blanc had cited a replica of Tanned skiing: “I’m leaving, but I’m afraid.” “He had told me: ‘I still have their role because they throw me a fart scoring, because I am afraid to return with the children. The paper scares me and, therefore, if it scares me, I have to do it because it means that I have not played it,'” recalls the director.
The name of Michel Blanc allows the film to be easily mount. His presence is a guarantee of seriousness because the actor rarely gives his confidence. “Michel, was someone who really chose his projects,” explains Mélanie Auffret. “When he said yes, he didn’t give you a flower because he was certainly not going to tell you that he courtesy.”
Small victories inspires real people. With his desired Michael Coscenarist, Mélanie Auffret investigated for two years to meet many people suffering from illiteracy. But for Michel Blanc, it is not about carrying out the same research work to prepare his role. “It is not me who must go to Émile. It is Émile who has to come to me,” he tells its director.
“Michel was very anxious”
The first day of filming, “Michel is very anxious, very stressed,” reminds the director. He attacks her with questions about her character’s accessories: “Why did you choose this plastic bag? Why this color? Why this material? I am not sure to sit like this. Why did you choose these boards?” “Fortunately, I knew my subject well. I had an answer to everything.”
Something more tormented Michel Blanc. “I was also a little impressed with the idea of shooting with the children,” recalls Mélanie Auffret. “I was afraid that it was very noisy and that it was the bazaar. We had really prepared the thing. I had worked hard with my little Loulous to be fine. And I had asked my first assistant that the whole film was filmed in chronological order.”
“That is to say that the first time the children saw Michel and that Michel saw the children, was the first scene of the movie,” he continues. “I also asked the parents not to show Michel’s movies to the little ones because they didn’t want them to be too impressed. There was enough to play.” In this context, the actor quickly finds his brands.
A real complicity
During the days, Mélanie Auffret has a real bond with Michel Blanc. “I was going to eat with him very often for lunch.
Michel Blanc also makes friends with a young actor in the movie, Elliott. “They were the two pipes, we didn’t stop them anymore! There really was something very strong between the two. There were two originals. Eliott was a fabulous child, with his own universe. Michel too. Both were very shy and suddenly, the two together …”
In the set of Small victoriesEverything is a miracle. Even Michel Blanc’s last plan, when his character discovers the sea for the first time. “This capture was great. There was grace. Michel was fabulous. When he finished, he was a little disgusted that Michel was so good. We would have liked him to stop.”
If Michel Blanc could be difficult enough with her films, she loved deeply HE Small victories. “I had found it very moving. I had found that relationships with the children worked very well. He had told me: ‘Your beginning, it is not good, but after your movie wins. So, if you get your movie to start hard and end out loud, there you are visiting the strike.'” She followed her advice.
Dad hen
At the International Comedy Film Festival Alpe d’Huez in January 2023, Small victories Say two awards: that of the public and that of the jury. Mélanie Auffret, who turns through France to present his film there in preview, is supported from a distance by a very protective white Michel. “So where are you there? (…) How do you keep it? You must be tired. You eat well?
Very proud of the film, he remains present even after launch. While the first figures of the box office encourage Michel Blanc called Mélanie Auffret the day after the departure: “They are the figures, they are very, very good. Well, obviously, you have to see how it remains this weekend. We hope that the weather is rotten as if people go to the movies.”
After launch, they remain linked. At the beginning of 2024, when a storm shakes Brittany, which she is, Michel Blanc called Mélanie Auffret in a disaster to receive her news. “Fortunately you won quickly, otherwise, I would have been very worried,” exclaims the actor by phone. “You are not driving, it is a blow to have a car accident,” he prays.
A few days before his death, Michel Blanc contacts Julia Piaton. He wants to dine with the actress and Mélanie Aupret. Filming energy Small victories I was missing. Dinner will never be done. If I had not died brutally, the director would have reworked with him. She had ideas. “As I was lucky to be able to say that I knew him, he could have taken it to something else,” he concludes.
Source: BFM TV
