2023-12-23 12:14:54
By Le Figaro with AFP
Published yesterday at 11:00, Updated yesterday at 11:14
Singer Jacques Brel in concert at L’Olympia in 1966. Bridgeman Images
Farewell by Jacques Brel, solo concert by Paul McCartney, anecdotes by Jean-Louis Aubert… The Canal L’Olympia creation from dream to stage, produced by Agathe Lanté, retraces the significant events of the Parisian venue.
Paul McCartney moved, Jacques Brel given a standing ovation in a bathrobe: The Olympia is told in a documentary on Canal+ for its 130th anniversary, between strong archives and rare testimonies, like that of Jean-Louis Aubert, king of freeloaders before the success with Telephone.
These images have entered the history of the Olympia in particular and the music hall in general. Cameras were rolling in the famous Parisian hall with red letters on October 28 and 29, 1966 to immortalize Jacques Brel’s farewell, even if it was not his last formal concert. The singer of Mathilde will return seven times – including in a big striped bathrobe – to greet the audience between the curtains and give him a standing ovation.
This is a sequence that we see in The Olympia from dream to stage, documentary directed by Agathe Lanté, created by Canal+, broadcast on this channel and in replay on myCANAL. These moments have traveled the world but are accompanied by lesser known testimonies. Like that of Marilyn, emblematic waitress at the artists’ bar, near the dressing rooms and not accessible to the public, a place which now bears her name. This woman with thick-rimmed glasses remembers that Brel “vomited from stage fright» every time before entering the stage. Episodes which date back to the glorious days of Bruno Coquatrix, general director from 1954 to 1979, who remained in the legend.
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Paul McCartney, who has seen others with the Beatles, is caught by the cameras, very moved, when he returns to sing Blackbird, to the cheers of the crowd, during a solo concert in 2007. The best anecdotes come from Jean-Louis Aubert. The singer confesses that, in his younger years, he enjoyed entering without paying by “air ducts” with her friends. Spotted one day by the police on the roofs, he accidentally crosses a glass roof. And still manages to enter the room, his face bloodied. People in the audience congratulate him on his makeup because, that evening, on stage, there is Kiss, a legendary heavy metal band, whose bassist enjoys spitting fake hemoglobin.
The emotional sequence goes to Patrick Ullmann, known as the photographer of L’Olympia, who was literally part of the walls. Bruno Coquatrix left him the keys and even set up his room in an unoccupied space under the stage. Patrick Ullmann evokes Edith Piaf, during one of his last passages, “little candle that will go out» before entering the stage and being reborn in front of a sobbing audience. The Olympia has been owned by the Vivendi group (which includes Canal+) since 2001.
The documentary The Olympia from dream to stage will be broadcast on Canal+ on December 20 and 26.
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