Q&A: All About Actresses

French actress Maïwenn Le Besco (Haute Tension, The Fifth Element) has been gravitating towards a career behind the camera as a writer/director. In her second directorial film, All About Actresses, she brings it all together: Le Besco wrote the screenplay and then played herself in the movie, as a director of a documentary about the lives, dreams and careers of French actresses. There are also musical numbers.

After the screening, Maïwenn flipped the usual order of a Q&A and threw a question to the amused audience  “Did you understand that it was not a documentary?” She wanted the audience to be uncertain. “Is it real? It is false?" she asked. "Is it a documentary or a fiction? That was the goal.” 

She cites This is Spinal Tap as an inspiration for her musical mockumentary “You have to see that movie. It’s so great.” But otherwise her life inspired the picture. “I’m an actress. My friends are actresses. I’ve been famous, then I’ve been forgotten." Maïwenn was conveying her world, but “Everything is fake.” For example, the acclaimed actress Karin Viard plays herself as an egotistical star who dreams only of leaving French cinema for American blockbusters. “I talked to her on the phone yesterday,” Maïwenn laughs, “and she said ‘Tell them I don’t give a damn about having a career in America!’”

Though everything was initially scripted, the actress/director encouraged improvisation from her starry cast. “I didn’t want the actors to learn lines…and recycle lines. I wanted a movie that sounds natural.”

The directors playing themselves were harder to convince. “How did I convince them? First of all, I tried to be funny,” Maïwenn explained. When that didn’t work, she showed them her debut film Pardonnez-Moi and they signed on.

Maïwenn is aware that some of the movie's humor will be lost outside of France. The twist on the celebrity personas might not register. One example she cited is Joey Starr, who plays her supportive boyfriend in the movie. His reputation is closer to Snoop Dogg’s in America. “He’s a very famous rap singer. He’s known as a bad boy,” she explained.

The most unusual aspect of the film is the musical sequences, in which the famous actresses playing themselves address the camera. After discussing some technical details, Le Besco explained that they’re in the movie to add color and glamour. “I wanted to give to the movie another dimension. I didn’t want only the style of documentary. I had so many French actresses. I wanted to play Barbie!”
 

All About Actresses is playing throughout the Festival.

Read more Festival Q&As .