By Elsa Girard-Basset | Web journalist
If the general public mainly remembers her romance with Johnny Depp, Vanessa Paradis had another intense relationship with Lenny Kravitz in the early 1990s. Nearly 3 decades after this tumultuous episode in their respective lives, what both of them remember another one of these 5 years together? The New Yorker spoke on the subject with great frankness.
Among the artists who knew France up close, it is impossible not to mention Lenny Kravitz. Moreover, the American never hesitates to mention everything that links him directly or indirectly to France, and he proved it again recently. At the microphone of “Harper’s Bazaar”, the 60-year-old artist returned to the strong relationship that unites him to France, and to one of its stars in the person of Vanessa Paradis.
I literally fell in love. And then France was one of the first countries to adopt my music. I remember being invited to the Trans Musicales in Rennes and everything came together.
I spent more and more time in Paris, I met Vanessa Paradis, we made music together. I was coming and going, and eventually I found a place of my own. It’s actually the only city where I own a house. The rest of the time I am in nature, in my two other homes, in Brazil and the Bahamas.
Lenny Kravitz only keeps the good on Vanessa Paradis
The tumultuous relationship between the interpreter of “Are you gonna go my way” and the young Frenchwoman extended from 1991 to 1996, and it was marked by the omnipresence of the paparazzi, as well as a certain toxicity. This painful and passionate romance, and far from always being divine to quote a famous song by Vanessa Paradis, has left its mark. But today, the two artists remain on good terms, as Kravitz explains:
I love her and, most of all, I love Vanessa. We are very friends, almost family. I still see her, we talk…
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Vanessa was the perfect woman but she came at the wrong time. I regret. And I hope she reads these lines.
Touching words from the sixty-year-old, who, at the time, was still fighting against many demons, and in particular the particularly difficult relationship with his father.
Following the breakup in 1996, and despite their artistic lives which could have brought them together at least once or twice, the former lovers never saw each other again. This is what Lenny Kravitz explained, although he does not despair:
Since then, I have never seen her again. She didn’t come to my concerts, we no longer had contact. I can only wish her to be happy. But I’m not worried. I know that one day we will bump into each other. And it will be time to talk about all this.
We had good times. We made some good songs. I still feel privileged to have experienced this story with Vanessa.
If life separated Lenny Kravitz and Vanessa Paradis after a perfectable romance which left a few regrets here and there for each of them, time seems to have done its work, on the American’s side at least. It would therefore be interesting to have the perspective of the French actress and singer, who has rebuilt her life several times since.
