Guillaume Rappeneau
Film producer
Has just produced "L’Attrape-Salinger" (Catching Salinger), a film about the legendary American writer of The Catcher in the Rye, in collaboration with Jean-Marie Périer and Frédéric Beigbeder (DVD available from March 20th).
- Paris
- Tips
Guillaume Rappeneau’s
Intellectual Paris
What makes you a real paryorker? Being just as at ease with the way both New York and Paris operate, although each city is the antithesis of the other.
How did you become one? By discovering New York with someone who adored it and gave me the bug.
How do these two cities contribute to balancing your personal and/or your professional life? New York and Paris are for me like Yin and Yang, polar opposites and totally indispensable to my balance.
What’s the difference between the New-Yorker you and the Parisian you? I am the same in both towns although I don’t do the same things in them at all.
What images do these two cities bring to mind? Paris is complex, horizontal, soft, voluptuous, spiritual… like a woman. New York is simple, vertical, rough, energetic and active… like a guy.
What illustrates their difference? Well, for example, it is very difficult to take a beautiful photo of Paris although it’s very easy to take a very beautiful photo of New York. There is a sort of obviousness in New York which makes the photo good whatever the framing or the viewpoint; the complexity and atmosphere of Paris are more difficult to represent.
What’s your fondest memory of Paris? I was 13 years old and going out with my family for dinner to friends of my parents who lived in the 7th arrondissement. When we were leaving, late, I saw a motorbike go by with a heavenly girl on the back wearing a split skirt which the wind was lifting up to her hips, revealing magnificent legs. I told myself that this city was truly amazing and I couldn’t wait to be grown up to be in the driver’s place!
What’s the first thing you do when you set foot in Paris? I go to the Café de Flore to sip a Chablis and read Le Monde. Pure Parisianism.
And the last one, when you leave? Nothing special. Perhaps a glimpse at the Eiffel Tower which I would never normally look at. Another cliché.
Do you have a ritual that’s intimately related to the city? When I come back from New York, I watch the television a lot to readjust myself to it (American television is so bad) and for the pleasure of hearing French spoken and finding out what has been happening while I’ve been away. On American television, the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
What’s the best time of day for you in Paris? Lunchtime in the summer.
What excites you about Paris? The city’s sensuality and the way everything is intellectualized.
What annoys you? The slowness of the decision-making process at work.
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