Under option in: Taiwan
Denise was a television star in the 60s, every Sunday she presented a show called Discorama in which she launched and nurtured the careers of singers such as Barbara, Maxime Le Forestier and Véronique Sanson. It was all she lived for: other people’s talent. In January 1975 she was made redundant for political reasons. She was hoping to come back for “one last lap of honour”, as she called it. In 1981 people made lots of promises to her… not one of them was kept. She died, alone and quite forgotten, two years later.
Who was Denise really? What happens to a woman after she has been famous? After having her picture in the papers, being courted and living with the terror that it will all stop one day? Is Jeanne Rosen that far from this precipice beyond which you are forgotten?
Jeanne Rosen is a journalist and the author of a book that garnered unwarranted success. It took her ten years to realise that she is wrong about her own life, that she is not asking the right questions.
The person treading the tightrope was not her but just next to her.
After Val de Grâce, Colombe Schneck paints a portrait worthy of Denise Glaser, a television personality whose own life was discreet and mysterious, a play of light and shadow; at the same time she creates a mirror effect with a contemporary young journalist and writer painfully aware of how fragile glory can be. It is a modest, sincere kind of homage as much as an exploration of the flipside of fame.
Colombe Schneck was born in Paris in 1966. She is a journalist for the radio station France Inter. Her first book, in 2006, was the acclaimed L’increvable Monsieur Schneck, and she has written two other novels, Sa petite chérie (2007) and Val de Grâce (2008).
Qui était vraiment Denise ? Que devient-on après avoir été une femme célèbre ? Avoir sa photo dans le journal, être courtisée et vivre avec la crainte lancinante que tout s’arrête un jour. Jeanne Rosen est-elle si loin de ce précipice où on vous oublie ?
Jeanne Rosen est journaliste, auteur d’un livre qui a connu un succès immérité, et se rend compte qu’elle se trompe sur sa vie, que ces questions ne sont pas les bonnes.
Comme Denise, il lui aura fallu dix ans pour comprendre que la personne qui marchait sur le fil n’était pas elle. »
Après Val de Grâce, Colombe Schneck dessine le portrait digne de Denise Glaser, femme de télévision, à la vie discrète et mystérieuse, toute en ombre et lumière, tandis qu’en parallèle elle met en miroir une jeune journaliste et écrivain de notre époque qui ressent les fragilités de la gloire. C’est une façon d’hommage, pudique et sincère, autant qu’une réflexion fine sur les revers de la célébrité.