This author of successful comics from Dijon released a new album at the beginning of October, “Comédie française: Voyages dans l’Atechamre du Power”. He tells the story of Jean Racine’s power to Emmanuel Macron.
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After a comic strip on François Hollande’s campaign, another on his life at the Elysee Palace and an album devoted to Gérard Depardieu, with “Comédie française: Voyages dans l’Atechamre du Power”, Mathieu Sapin continues to comment on French political life . In his new production, he tries to recount the end of the five-year term of the socialist president, the arrival of Emmanuel Macron to power and his numerous attempts to approach him.
All against the backdrop of the story of the life of Jean Racine, the famous 17th century playwright who spent the second half of his life as Louis XIV’s historiographer. A work of 20 years ultimately futile since his writings disappeared in a fire shortly after his death.
When we witness the circles of power, it is difficult to be indifferent to them. In return, men of power have an attraction for artists, they want to seduce them and be surrounded by them.
What do Racine and Sapin have in common? “A relentless desire to rub shoulders with power”, according to the author. This tutelary figure “on the courtier and servile side” nevertheless does not “an enviable figure”. This perseverance in wanting to chronicle the lives of presidents pushes him to question his will: “When you are witness to this environment, it is difficult to be indifferent to it. In return, men of power have an attraction for artists, they want to seduce them and be surrounded by them”, thinks Mathieu Sapin.
Seduced, he is by Emmanuel Macron who gives him a wink after a brief meeting during the debate between the future president and Marine Le Pen, on May 3, 2017. “He has read my comic book on Gérard Depardieu and wants to meet him. We start to talk and I lose his contact (the head of state changes his phone number, editor’s note)“. There followed many more or less successful attempts to get close to the President. “Politicians protect themselves by creating a mask that can be compared to that of the actors. It’s difficult to have a natural and simple relationship”.
Despite everything, he had access to privileged moments during the presidency and this titillates the interest of the reader fond of politics. The album is full of anecdotes about the head of state, the presidential couple or the team around him. Mathieu Sapin likes to say that the First Lady used her boards to “hit” on her husband, as we can see in a photo posted on social networks.
A family from Côte-d’Or
Emmanuel Macron “didn’t hate his comic book” according to its author who sketched the drawing in the small town of Lantenay, a few kilometers from Dijon in the Côte-d’Or, in his father’s house, during confinement. Her sister, a colorist, finished the job and the album was released in early October. “My publisher just called me, a new edition of 10,000 copies will be launched”, enthuses Mathieu Sapin. 35,000 issues had already left the printing presses, a very good figure for an author of the 9th art.
“I come back very often to Côte-d’Or, my father and my sister still live there”, delivers the now Parisian who did all his schooling in Dijon including a year of philosophy at the university. His family of artists dragged his gaiters to the city’s cultural venues: “my father was a professor of art history at the Beaux-Arts in Dijon and my mother was a librarian at the municipal library and at that of the university”. It testifies : “When I was young, the city had another aspect. There were many car parks in the city center and pedestrian streets did not exist. Dijon has changed in the right direction”.
Mathieu Sapin is now planning to make a second film. After “Le Poulain” with Alexandra Lamy, released in 2017, he hopes to shoot “Fake News”, his new screenplay, next year. He narrates the fate of a Parisian journalist forced to flee the city, victim despite herself of social networks.
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© DR
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