Gérard Hernandez, who celebrates his 92nd birthday this Monday, January 20, 2025, is a hit every evening in Household scenes (M6). But the interpreter of Raymond did not just enjoy success on television. He also excelled in the theater in numerous roles, including that of Lucien Cheval in The idiots’ dinner. But this work, which was later adapted for the cinema, left him with a bitter taste.
In April 1998 was released The idiots’ dinner. A film directed by Francis Veber and which very quickly enjoyed success in the cinema. It tells the story of Pierre Brochant (played by Thierry Lhermitte), who organizes a stupid dinner every week with friends. Everyone brings a ‘stupid’ to dinner and the one who finds the most spectacular one wins. For the evening that we see in the film, he invited François Pignon (played by the late Jacques Villeret) and it turned into a nightmare, notably because of lumbago. The work was nominated six times for the 1999 César Awards and won three awards: Best Original Screenplay or Adaptation for Francis Veber, Best Actor for Jacques Villeret and Best Supporting Actor for Daniel Prévost. The latter played Lucien Cheval, a friend of Pierre Brochant.
Gérard Hernandez very upset against Francis Veber and Daniel Prevost
However, it was Gérard Hernandez who played it in the theater between 1996 and 1998. And suffice to say that he did not appreciate being ousted from the film by Francis Veber. “He’s not a very good person, Mr Veber, he’s not a nice guy. I almost broke his facebecause it doesn’t happen. In addition, I learned about it from the press, my agent had neither warned me nor defended me“, he confided in the columns of Schnock. And the director was not the only one in his sights. Actor Daniel Prévost also took it for granted: “He’s an idiot, a bad guy. Kind to adults, lousy to little ones. But I told him later. He didn’t understand why I didn’t want to shake his hand. But why didn’t he call me, just say something like: ‘I don’t understand why you’re not doing the film’? It happened to me, sometimes, that I was given a job that usually went to someone else, but I always called to ask: ‘Why isn’t it you?“It’s certain, these three will never have dinner together!
