Articles about France Télévisions
Night to remember
Nos vies en l’air (A Night to Live) writer Margaux Bonhomme discusses the challenging themes and format at the heart of this French coming-of-age drama, which centres on two desperate teens who find solace in strangers as they face a decision between life and death.
Into the Otherworld
Anaon director David Hourrègue reflects on making this fantastical French coming-of-age series and working with teenagers again after Skam France, and explains why making the show was the “greatest experience” of his career.
Lost Seul
The cast and creative team behind Seul (Alone at Sea) preview this France Télévisions TV movie about a yachtsman’s incredible voyage of survival during a solo around-the-world race, and reveal the challenges they faced filming at sea.
Keeping Count
Award-winning actor Jeremy Irons and director Bille August reflect on their long-running partnership as they reunite for their third project together, a series adaptation of Alexandre Dumas’ classic French novel The Count of Monte Cristo.
Hack race
Surveillance drama Concordia is set in a place ruled by AI – until a series of crimes put the titular town of the future on the verge of breakdown. Showrunner Frank Doelger and star Ruth Bradley give DQ a guided tour.
Dealing with desire
In Split, author and critic Iris Brey turns screenwriter and director for a story about a woman confronting her sexuality in the face of overwhelming desire. She joins co-writer Clémence Madeleine-Perdrillat and stars Alma Jodorowsky and Jehnny Beth to tell DQ about the series.
In the driving seat
Showrunner Eugen Tunik tells DQ how he wanted to look at the Ukraine war from a new angle with In Her Car, in which a therapist takes her clinic on the road to help a number of characters in distress.
Into the Vortex
Science-fiction crime drama Vortex – about a police officer attempting to change the past – is the first French series to use virtual production. DQ speaks to Fix Studio VFX producer Cédric Herbet about the demands of using this emerging technology.
Staying power
Filmed in impossibly challenging conditions, Those Who Stayed tells six stories of people who remained in Kyiv after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. DQ speaks to the producers and filmmakers behind the series to find out why and how they did it.
Global swarming
The Swarm is the eagerly anticipated big-budget adaptation of Frank Schätzing’s ecological disaster novel. DQ buzzes around production designer Julian Wagner, director Barbara Eder and VFX supervisor Jan Stoltz to hear about filming in Italy, shooting in water tanks and creating a pod of sleeping whales.
Vintage television
Writer Quoc Dang Tran and director Oded Ruskin raise a glass with DQ to toast completing the ‘impossible task’ of adapting 44-volume manga series Drops of God as an eight-part TV series, which follows two people competing to inherit the world’s finest wine collection.
Finding Sasha
French young-adult series Chair Tendre (About Sasha) explores teenage life from the perspective of Sasha, who was born intersex. Writer Yaël Langmann reveals the origins of the project, how she cast the lead role and the universality of its story.
Drinking it in
Screenwriter Quoc Dang Tran and the executives behind French-Japanese production Drops of God reveal how they have adapted a manga series about wine into an eight-part TV drama.
Getting Around
The stars of Around the World in 80 Days – David Tennant, Ibrahim Koma and Leonie Benesch – tell DQ about their adventure making this globetrotting period drama, which is pitched as a family-friendly take on Jules Verne’s classic tale.
Down and dirty
Revolution is in the air in Germinal, a six-part adaptation of Emile Zola’s classic novel. Director David Hourrègue reveals why he wanted to bring a fresh approach to the story of coal miners in 1860s France.
Democracy in action
DQ heads to Brussels, home of the EU, to watch filming of Parlement (Parliament), a drama about youth, commitment and making a difference in a post-Brexit world.
Head case
French crime drama Kepler(s) tackles mental health and the Calais migrant crisis in the story of a police officer secretly struggling with multiple personality disorder who is sent to investigate the murder of a student in the port town. DQ meets the writers and producers.
Fashion show
The cast of Amazon’s latest release, The Collection, open the doors to the fashion house drama.
Women re-energise crime drama
In honour of ITV’s Brit noir series Marcella, we look at some of the women detectives who have helped reinvigorate a genre that used to be the preserve of cantankerous middle-aged men.
Moving mountains to make authentic Icelandic thriller
Klaus Zimmermann and Clive Bradley reveal how they kept crime thriller Trapped grounded in its Icelandic setting while navigating the tricky waters around this intricate international coproduction.