A column in partnership with The Team.
Today we welcome Jean-Philippe Leclaire from the newspaper “L’Equipe” who talks to us about sport and cinema.
I know that you are a big movie buff, particularly knowledgeable about the filmographies of directors Ingmar Bergman and Max Pecas. It has therefore not escaped your attention that next Wednesday, the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival will begin. Ah! Cannes! Its Croisette, its red carpet, its climb of the steps, its Palme d’Or, its parties, its freeloaders and its starlets… In Cannes, everything is cinema, even football. The proof: the Cannes Sports Association, a modest Nationale 2 club, the fourth division of French football, has belonged for a year to wealthy film producers, the Americans Dan Friedkin and his son Ryan.
On the red carpet side, Dan Friedkin, the fifty-nine-year-old dad, has a pretty good track record. He notably produced “The Square”, Palme d’Or at Cannes, in 2017. We also owe him films like “The Mule” by and with Clint Eastwood or “Killers of the Flowermoon”, the latest masterpiece by Martin Scorsese, with Leonardo di Caprio and Robert De Niro.
On the green carpet side, the Friedkin father and son are already owners of a much more prestigious football club, AS Roma, three times Italian champion and winner of a European Cup two years ago.
But then why did the Friedkins buy the Cannes football club?
Well, Céline, it’s an excellent question that a year after the takeover, the people of Cannes continue to ask themselves. At the time of the sale, Dan and Ryan Friedkin held a brief press conference, but reporters were not allowed to ask questions, and neither father nor son has given an interview since. Perhaps they want to eventually transform AS Cannes into a branch club of AS Rome. Young Roman players could come and learn their skills in the tough competitions of the French lower divisions before returning to shine with the Italian parent company. We are also talking about possible real estate plans, because next to the Pierre-de-Coubertin stadium, there is a huge parking lot where it would be tempting to build luxury residences. But the mayor of Cannes, David Lisnard, categorically denies these rumors. So, there is another hypothesis, a bit far-fetched but after all why not…
Which ?
The Friedkins, experts in storytelling and well-crafted scenarios, were perhaps simply seduced by the story of AS Cannes. Founded at the beginning of the last century by a group of friends from the La Bocca district, including an Englishman, Herbert Lowe, the Riviera club won the Coupe de France in 1932. But French football must above all thank the Rouge et Blanc for having formed and launched the great, immense Zinedine Zidane. Coming from his native Marseille in 1987, when he was only fifteen years old, the young Zizou – at the time he was nicknamed Yazid – spent five years at the Cannes training center. He lived with a host family, with Nicole and Jean-Claude Elineau. And he therefore played his first professional matches at the Pierre-de-Coubertin stadium. So, if the Friedkins want to finance a Zizou biopic one day, they already have some of the natural settings.
Have the Americans already invested a lot of money in AS Cannes?
For the moment no. But yes they Cannes. At the time of the sale, the 2023-2024 budget had already been finalized. With 1.6 million euros, it is only the sixth budget for group A of Nationale 2. But Dan Friedkin has a personal fortune estimated at 6.3 billion dollars. Figures that inevitably make Red and White supporters dream. The objective is to quickly climb the ranks to Ligue 2, or even Ligue 1, which AS Cannes has not visited since 1998, the year when its most famous former player, Zinédine Zidane, won the Coupe du world with the Blues. In the meantime, the Cannes footballers, currently fourth in their group, travel to Hyères tomorrow, before concluding the season by hosting Thonon Evian. We are not yet in the super Hollywood production, more in the arthouse film.
