Some sixty personalities from the world of culture denounce a “lynching” of Gérard Depardieu, accused of rape since 2020 and in the heart of a scandal that became political-media after a documentary broadcast on France 2in a column published Monday night on the website of the Figaropreviously announced in the columns of Le Parisien.
Among them are the director Bertrand Blier, the actresses Nathalie Baye, Carole Bouquet or Charlotte Rampling, the actors Jacques Weber, Pierre Richard or Gérard Darmon, but also the singers Roberto Alagna, Carla Bruni, Arielle Dombasle or Jacques Dutronc.
“Gérard Depardieu is probably the best actor. The last sacred monster of cinema. We can no longer remain silent in the face of the lynching that fell upon him, in the face of the torrent of hatred that is poured out on his person, without nuances, in the most complete amalgam and challenging a presumption of innocence from which he would have benefited, like everyone else, if he were not the giant of cinema that he is,” they write in this text.
“It is art that we are attacking”
“When we attack Gérard Depardieu in this way, we attack art. Through his genius as an actor, Gérard Depardieu contributes to the artistic influence of our country. (…) Whatever happens, no one will ever be able to erase the indelible mark of his work that will forever mark our time. The rest, everything else, concerns justice; than justice. Exclusively,” they add.
The President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron and members of the actor's family, including his daughter julieHe had already spoken publicly to defend Gérard Depardieu, accused after one of the two complaints against him in France and who denies these accusations.
The recent broadcast of a report about the actor, in the program “Complément d'investigation” on the France 2 channel, caused a commotion with international repercussions.
In these images, Gérard Depardieu, known for having played Cyrano de Bergerac, multiplies misogynistic and insulting comments when addressing women, without sparing a girl comments of a sexual nature.
The France Télévisions group assured on Friday that this last passage had been “authenticated” by a bailiff. This reaction came after statements by the Head of State on France 5 that suggested that the sequence could have been modified during editing, as the actor's family had previously stated.
Since the scandal, Gérard Depardieu has been removed from the National Order of Quebec and his title of honorary citizen of the municipality of Estaimpuis (Belgium), while his wax statue has been removed from the tourist route of the Grévin museum in Paris.
