Aside from the intensity of film sets, the actress appears very peaceful, finding among her loved ones a haven of peace to which she can turn in all circumstances. “I am lucky to have a family who is very present for me. I try to put markers around my son. I don’t spend more than four nights away from him when he’s with my father.” A few months ago, after a series of filming and promotional tours, she took a break. “I only acted in the Lena Dunham series, Too Muchwith Emily Ratajkowski and Megan Stalter, in London. Then I gave myself some free time. I was able to enjoy my son and everyday life with him. Initially, I wanted us to have an incredible vacation, but I understood that that wasn't the main thing. A 7 year old child, what he wants is to be bathed, cooked for him, put to bed. He wants everyday life, he wants 'not bad'. He wants to come to school and see your face when you leave. Today, I know that when I have intense periods when I am working, I am prepared to not read scripts for a while to be close to my son.”
So are there two Adèle Exarchopoulos? On one side, the actress, filled with an ardent passion for creation and cinema, and on the other the mother, more patient and sensitive to the beauty of the banal? Are these two roles two sides of the same coin? “I don’t have a quiet strength of patience deep within me. I like the urgency of living, of making choices. Being a mother requires you to be patient. When every morning, you have to repeat ten times to your child, 'Put on your underwear, put on your underwear!', at a given moment, you learn to find diversions, to find games.” Sometimes the mother and the actress must have an inner dialogue to find common ground. “The question I ask myself now, before accepting a project, is whether it really deserves logistics to be put in place so that I can see my son, who is at school. I think we don't talk enough about the fact that it's a job where we're absent a lot. It must be the same for fathers. It’s a super complex subject.”
Adèle Exarchopoulos always seems to have accepted her status as a star only half-heartedly, seeing the risk of losing more than a part of her. Following the success of The Life of Adèleshe returned to sell sandwiches with her father in Bercy. A short-lived experience which already told something of her personality, a desire not to turn her back on the world in which she had asserted herself when she was younger. “Cinema, for me, is not life. I'm not looking to be buried next to my Caesar. In my family, there is as much room for me as for my brothers, who work in air conditioning or plumbing. When I come home, I always have to go get peppers for my dad to finish cooking and I always have to change the cage of my little brother's canaries. I remain my parents’ daughter and that’s my best role.”
