L’ALLIANCE ET GUILLAUME, À TABLE !

On Friday, April 24, the Alliance Française de Chicago, in partnership with L’Atelier de la langue française, was honored to welcome French actor, screenwriter, and film director Guillaume Gallienne for a talk about his career and his first novel, Le Buveur de brume (Stock, 2025).

Aimée Laberge reports on the conversation between the French actor and Hugo Pinatel, as well as what it is like to be “à table” with Guillaume… where he shared a few tips on visiting museums with children, reading Proust, and dining in Paris.

LA COMÉDIE-FRANÇAISE

PC: Sean Su

First and foremost, Guillaume Gallienne is a comédien: an actor, and the 513th member—or sociétaire—of the storied Comédie-Française. Founded in 1680 following the death of Molière, the Comédie-Française is the oldest active theater company in the world and is renowned for staging the great classics: Racine, Corneille, Victor Hugo… In addition to its 40 sociétaires, the company includes 18 pensionnaires, or junior actors, united under the motto Simul et Singulis: « Être ensemble et être soi-même » —Being together and being oneself. It is very much in the spirit of “being oneself” that Gallienne, in 2008, staged his award- winning one-man show, Les garçons et Guillaume, à table!

“My earliest memory of my mother dates from when I was four or five: she called my two brothers and me to the table, saying, ‘Boys, Guillaume, dinner!’ And the last time I spoke to her on the phone, she hung up saying, ‘Take care, my big girl.’ And, well, between the two, there were quite a few misunderstandings.”

Gallienne’s next coup d’éclat was the film adaptation of his stage performance, Me, Myself and Mum, which he wrote, directed, and starred in. A huge success, it won five César Awards. Which brings us to… his voice. It took Gallienne four years of twice-weekly sessions with a speech therapist to find his range as a baritone. Yet, whenever the therapist asked him about his mother, his voice would rise again toward soprano.

PC: Sean Su

Here in Chicago, Gallienne spoke with the poshest of British accents. How did this come about? He confided at dinner that, growing up, he had a Scottish nanny from Aberdeen before being sent to a British boarding school where he played rugby.

He went on to perform Glaswegian and Liverpudlian accents for us, before explaining that French actors do not “do accents” because they don’t interpret—they embody (ils incarnent!). Then he explained the fundamental differences between acting in English and in French. La Voix! Le Corps! he said. A French actor is all voice: the body remains still, the arms at rest, the gaze steady. The voice is the enchantment, the tool of seduction. By contrast, American actors are all about Le Corps. They move, they jump, they occupy and energize the stage with their body.

LE BUVEUR DE BRUME / THE FOG CATCHER

PC: Sean Su

Published in the series Ma nuit au musée, Gallienne chose to spend a night at the National Museum of Tbilisi, Georgia, beside the portrait of his beloved great- grandmother, Princess Melita Cholokashvili—known as Babou—an opportunity to explore his Russian-Georgian ancestry.

What follows is a very long night on a camp bed in the wrong building—in the company of three security guards named Guìo. Babou’s portrait has been hastily hung in a corridor beside the cafeteria for administrative reasons. Proud of his heritage yet feeling treated as a second-class citizen—or worse, a tourist—Gallienne begins shouting: «Vous n’aurez pas mes rêves ! » Once he has calmed down—helped along by strong coffee brought by one of the Guìos—he begins to write.

Le Buveur de brume is Gallienne’s first book. Having shared his love of la grande littérature on French radio for the past ten years in the program Ça peut pas faire de mal, he worried how he could possibly write with the deceptive simplicity of Simenon (Il pleut) or the devastating authenticity of Camus (Aujourd’hui, maman est morte) without making a fool of himself. It took him 18 months to complete a first draft he described as “complete shit.” His writer friends replied “First drafts are always shit! No need to write War and Peace… just WRITE.” And he did. Once again, Gallienne wins us over with his voice—funny, tender, intimate. Reading Le Buveur de brume is like listening to your best friend share childhood memories over a café crème in Paris.

Guillaume’s Tip No. 1: A Museum Game for Children When visiting a museum, have your child go into another room and choose a work of art while you wait. The child returns and describes the artwork to you. Then you go together to find it. It’s a winner! And it teaches children how to describe art. Variation: the child invents a title for an artwork and shares it with you; you then try to guess which artwork it is. An art critic in the making!

PROUST ET L’AMÉRIQUE

PC: Sean Su

Back on stage at the Alliance, Hugo Pinatel, with an adorable French accent, asks his first question: “What does America represent for you?” In Le Buveur de brume, Gallienne recounts summers spent en famille in the United States, first on road trips in a station wagon, driving for miles before sleeping over in Motor Inns punctuated by stays in motels, or back-breaking misadventures riding horses for days on end in the Canadian Rockies. Perhaps this is why he associates America first with space, and with an “everything-is- possible” spirit. Gallienne also expressed admiration for the the American university system—though he noted, with amusement, that when he taught a class on Le sentiment amoureux at Princeton, something seemed missing: no one was holding hands or kissing on campus!. Students, he observed, were highly individualistic and obsessed with results.

Asked about his favorite American authors, he cited Jim Harrison and William Faulkner. For music, he immediately named “The Boss,” Bruce Springsteen. Le Buveur de brume opens with a lovely quotation from Marcel Proust, Gallienne’s favorite author. He had precise instructions for us on how to start our journey reading À la recherche du temps perdu.

Guillaume’s Tip No. 2: How to Start Reading Proust Surtout! Don’t start with Book I (Du côté de chez Swann). Begin with Book III (Le Côté de Guermantes), it’s fun! Then move on to Book IV (Sodome et Gomorrhe).

The evening concluded with Gallienne reading the famous opening scene in which the smell and taste of the famous madelaine dipped in tea triggers the vast, seven-volume masterpiece of modern literature.

Hearing these lines read by the 513th sociétaire, in his rich baritone, was unforgettable: “And soon, mechanically, weary after a dull day with the prospect of a depressing morrow, I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid, and the crumbs with it, touched my palate, a shudder ran through my whole body, and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place.”

L’ALLIANCE ET GUILLAUME, À TABLE!

PC: Sean Su

After signing books and greeting guests, Gallienne braved a windy Chicago Avenue for a well-earned dinner. On the menu: American classics—Caesar salad, burgers, Ralph’s coffee ice cream—all served in generous portions, accompanied by ample wine for Georgian-style toasts led by our guest of honor. At our table were Mary Ellen Connellan, Executive Director of the Alliance Française de Chicago, and Nathalie Filser, the French Consulate’s Cultural Attachée. The Alliance’s president, Rick Shepro, and his wife Lindsay—both fine gourmets—bonded with Gallienne over food, wine, and shared affiliations with mysterious and secretive French gastronomic clubs. But Guillaume made no secret of his go-to restaurants in Paris…

Guillaume’s Tip No. 3: Eat Like A Comédien in Paris Before or after a performance at the Comédie-Française on Place Colette in the 1er arrondissement, visit Crudus, 21 rue Saint-Roch, for excellent and affordable Italian cuisine—and perhaps catch a glimpse of les comédiens! For seafood, Gallienne recommends La Cagouille, near Gare Montparnasse, once frequented by President Mitterrand and recognized by Wine Spectator. Romantic brasserie dining is at its best at Le Voltaire in the 7ième. A review describes it as ”inviting leisurely noon lunches that end as dusk settles on a third or fourth grasshopper cocktail.” After all this, Gallienne revealed that his favorite American dish is… the humble oatmeal cookie!

PC: Sean Su

Soon it was time to say au revoir. I had confided to our guest of honor earlier that when in Paris, I love going to the Palais Garnier for opera where jetlag can get the better of me. I called it the best nap ever, in a quiet box lined with red velvet chairs retaining the faint scent of previous spectators… As we parted, he said: “Come see me at the Comédie-Française!”—and, with a smile, added just for me: “After your nap at the Palais Garnier.”

Mille mercis, Guillaume!

JOHN SHEDD REED

Gallienne’s visit would not have been possible without John Shedd Reed, a Chicago philanthropist and longtime member of the Alliance’s Board of Directors. A fund was established in his memory to support an annual lecture series on Contemporary France. Special thanks also to former Alliance intern Jérémie Cornu, now working with Hugo Pinatel in Aix-en-Provence at L’Atelier de la langue française, for reaching out to us with a proposal we could not refuse.

And finally, in his characteristic modesty, Gallienne did not mention that he was named Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur—the highest honor in France—by President Emmanuel Macron himself at the Élysée Palace on March 16, 2026. On le félicite!

And it all began with his mother calling him ma chérie…