“I can’t stand listening to Charles Aznavour yelling at the children on the other side of the apartment!” If this falsely exasperated text message from Leïla Bekhti, Tahar Rahim’s wife, made Grand Corps Malade smile when he received it, it did not surprise him. The co-director, with Mehdi Idir, of Mr. Aznavour, biopic dedicated to one of the last sacred monsters of French song, saw how the actor worked on his role. He observed Tahar Rahim slowly slip into the skin of Charles Aznavour, hooking him with a facial expression, a word, a look and inhabiting his body for several weeks, to the point of never taking off the oral prosthesis that deformed his lower lip.
The actor did not imitate Charles Aznavour, nor did he play him: he reinvented himself as Charles Aznavour, even in his everyday life. To the point that Gérard Davoust, the former producer of the singer who died in 2018, at the age of 94, and who spent more than forty years at his side, almost cried. “The day I was invited, when I arrived on the set, I saw a silhouette in a poorly lit setting… My heart stopped: in front of me, I had Charles,” he says, still moved.
And to think that, originally, no one had thought of Tahar Rahim for the role! When they began their research, Grand Corps Malade, Mehdi Idir and their producer, Jean-Rachid Kallouche, were keen to find unknowns, up-and-coming artists to give a chance to, as they did for their two previous feature films, Patients (2016) and School life (2019). Time passes. The start of filming is looming and still no one to play the star. Jean-Rachid Kallouche often discusses it with Tahar Rahim, to whom he is very close. The actor suggests names, leads: “Did you go to the Conservatory?” In vain.
David Bertrand, the film’s casting director, finally asks: “But why don’t you propose to Tahar?” The team is excited, with one exception: Jean-Rachid Kallouche. The producer knew Charles Aznavour well – he married Katia, one of his two daughters – and he is adamant: he “doesn’t see”our father-in-law when he “look at Tahar”. At the insistence of others, he finally agrees to discuss it with his friend, whom he joins one evening at a restaurant. Tahar Rahim arrives from the United States, where he filmed Mrs. Web, a Marvel production directed by SJ Clarkson. “They thought of you,” Jean-Rachid Kallouche says between two courses. Once the surprise has passed, his interlocutor seems hesitant, especially since Aznavour’s son-in-law makes no secret of his reservations. A few days later, the actor nevertheless replies that he is up for it. “And there we discovered the ‘Tahar method'”, remembers Grand Corps Malade.
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