The taste of others on France 5: The recipe for success for the tandem Agnès Jaoui-Jean-Pierre Bacri

Also accomplices on that outside the sets, they struck a big blow in 2000 with their first common achievement.

In French cinema, they embodied the image of the duo of authors par excellence. In love with the verb, the dialogues and the study of human characters, Agnès Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri built their personal touch together which made them multi-cassottes talents which hexagonal cinema loves: actors and writers in duo, it sometimes goes to realization, they have signed several works noticed in the last thirty years. Notably Smoking/No Smoking And We know the song For Alain Resnais (released in 1993 and 1997), A family air For Cédric Klapisch (1996), The taste of others (2000), Like an image (2004), At the end of the tale (2013) or Public squarestaged by Jaoui … “Jabac” was synonymous with success. Until the sad disappearance of Jean-Pierre Bacri in early 2021.

One of the films that best symbolizes their style? The taste of others marked a turning point in the couple’s career. After a small decade to make a name for itself among the most sharp writers in the middle, Jaoui and Bacri decide to go behind the camera for in the early 2000s for this “choral dramedie” which has quickly become cult, to review this Friday evening on France 5.

Jean-Pierre Bacri: “The stories where everyone is going very well do not interest me”

The culmination of a long success story

The names of Agnes Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri are so inseparable from each other that we would almost end up forgetting the circumstances of their meeting. In 1986, the two actors will be compared not by cinema, but by their other passion, theater. Director Jean-Michel Ribes brings them together to the distribution of his adaptation of Birthday Harold Pinter. The beginning of an artistic and love love at first sight, one never really going without the other.

Eager to continue to collaborate together, it is through writing that their tandem begins to take root in the spirits. In 1991, they signed the play Kitchen and outbuildings which makes up the room at the La Bruyère Theater then at the Montparnasse theater. Philippe Muyl turns the cinmatographic adaptation which in turn was a great success in theaters in 1993, and a little more cement the troop of the faithful of the duo, where we find in particular Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Zabou Breitman and Sam Karmann.

Their success is worth it to be noticed by the one who will become their cinema mentor, Alain Resnais. THE “Jabac”as Resnais nicknamed them, sign for him in the 1990s the scenarios of Smoking/No Smoking (1993), adaptation of one of the pieces of Alan Ayckbourn that the filmmaker brought to the screen, andWe know the song. In a decade, Jaoui and Bacri sign in all five scenarios … and win three César: two for the films of Resnais, and a third for A family airadaptation of their own room with Cédric Klapisch.

A method without certainties

For those who have become multi-casquette artists at the same time actors, directors and producers (they found their own production house, the A4 films, with their friend Sam Karmann in 1997), there is still a course to cross: that of realization. It will be done in 2000 with The taste of others. A film marked as well by their love of theater (from the Berenice from root toHedda Gabler of ibsen) that by their sharp sense of dialogues, social observation and their common experience.

The genesis of Others’s taste However, was not as fluid as one would think, since originally, it had been thought of as a radically different genre film. In an interview with L’Express In 2013, Agnès Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri returned to their working methods and explained what The taste of others was originally a project that is clearly different from the one who was envisaged at the start.

“Agnès Jaoui: The truth is that when you get too tank out from the start, in general, it is a failure and you abandon. The taste of others was to be a detective film. We worked two months with these constraints before letting go.

Jean-Pierre Bacri: There are still certain elements: the driver, the bodyguard, the shit dealeuse … The imposed figures of the thriller have tired us. When we abandon the form, what remains are the relationships between people. This is what interests us, basically“.

Alongside Anne Alvaro, Alain Chabat or Gérard Lanvin, there are also some regulars from the clan “Jabac” Like Wladimir Yordanoff, already on the bill ofA family airSam Karmann (still him) or Robert Bacri, the father of Jean-Pierre, in a small role. A cast like the tribe spirit which often inhabits the creations of the tandem.

When Alain Chabat presented Didier in Première: “It’s a film of friends”

A success which called others

When it comes out in theaters, The taste of others was a great success, attracting no less than 3.8 million spectators in theaters. The criticism, it warmly welcomes the film, like Firstwho writes when released in theaters: “The normal people of Bacri and Jaoui are not only exceptional, it is their accuracy to transcribe their normality which is extraordinary“. To complete the success of this test, The taste of others Rans nine nominations to the César and leaves with those of the best film, the best actor and the best actress in a supporting role, as well as that, once again, of the best scenario. A few days later, the film even represents France at the Oscar for the best foreign film, before being beaten by Tiger and Dragon.

Nevertheless, Jaoui and Bacri have now also made a name as filmmakers. And if they continue to turn in front of the camera, alone or together, they will subsequently chain the successes with Like an image in 2004 (screenplay prize at the Cannes Film Festival), Tell me about the rain In 2008, At the end of the tale in 2013 (one million admissions each), and finally Public squaretheir latest film released in the cinema in 2018.

Success is never written better than two, therefore, even since the separation of the couple in 2012. A separation that did not prevent them from continuing to work together, as Agnès Jaoui explained in an interview with Paris Match In August 2012: “We have always made the share of things. I like to write with Jean-Pierre, I like to see Jean-Pierre. I think what we do for two is better than what I would do alone. Finally, it would be different, but I am not tired of continuing to explore writing with him. On the contrary“. Separated but inseparable therefore.

At the end of 2014, Jean-Pierre Bacri mentioned their multiple collaborations in these terms: “We are not fans of films centered on couples for example, with claims around which have only uninteresting or indigent scenes to play. We call on actors so that they assume real roles. A troop spirit animates us, in a way. It has become our taste, as a habit becomes a taste.” (the full interview is to be read here)

The history of Others’s taste : Castella is a business manager who is not very focused on culture. However, one evening, by going by obligation to attend a representation of ” Bérénice ”, he falls in worship of the text and the main actress, Clara. By a coincidence, she will give him English lessons, necessary for his work. Castella tries to integrate into this artistic environment but without much success. We do not shake up reference frames and cultural barriers without doing stories.

Trailer: