An open letter penned by dozens of actresses and different artists in protection of Gerard Depardieu, the cinema large accused of sexual harassment, has laid naked divisions in France over the #Metoo reckoning with sexism. Actresses Nathalie Baye and Carole Bouquet – a former associate of Depardieu – in addition to singer and former first woman Carla Bruni had been among the many greater than 50 family cultural figures who referred to as Depardieu the sufferer of a public “lynching”.

Entitled ‘Don’t Cancel Gerard Depardieu’, the letter revealed this week in conservative each day Le Figaro alleged Depardieu had been the recipient of a “torrent of hatred”. “We can no longer remain silent in the face of the lynching that has descended upon him,” the letter’s authors wrote.

“Gerard Depardieu is probably the greatest of all actors. When you attack Gerard Depardieu like this, it is art you are attacking.” Depardieu, 75, who has starred in scores of French-language motion pictures, rising to prominence in 1974 with “Going Places”, has been on the centre of a rising variety of sexual assault allegations lately.

In March, 2022, investigative magistrates positioned Depardieu below formal investigation in a single case on suspicion of rape and sexual assault. Actress Charlotte Arnould, 28, later revealed she was behind these accusations, saying she couldn’t bear remaining silent any longer. Since then, greater than 10 ladies have accused Depardieu of sexual violence. Depardieu has constantly denied any wrongdoing and thru his attorneys beforehand “firmly rejected” the accusations in opposition to him.

“Never, absolutely never, have I abused a woman,” he wrote in an Oct. 2 letter additionally revealed in Le Figaro. He has not been convicted of any of the accusations in opposition to him. President Emmanuel Macron rallied to the protection of Depardieu shortly earlier than Christmas, when requested in an interview about his tradition minister’s plans to evaluate Depardieu’s Legion d’Honneur medal – France’s highest ornament.

Macron condemned the “manhunt” in opposition to Depardieu with out expressing sympathy for his alleged victims. “He’s an immense actor, a genius of his art,” Macron mentioned. “He makes France proud.” GENERATIONAL DIVIDE

The president’s remarks and Monday’s letter drew dismay from feminists and youthful actresses who decry an try and drown out the voices of victims of sexual violence and undermine the #Metoo motion in opposition to sexual harassment in France. “There’s a generation that still doesn’t understand this societal evolution,” Murielle Reus, vp of #MeTooMedia which campaigns in opposition to sexism and sexual misconduct within the media, mentioned in a radio interview this week.

Critics of the #Metoo marketing campaign in France accuse it of a puritanical struggle fuelled by a contempt for males and the artwork of seduction. Catherine Deneuve, one in all France’s greatest identified actresses, was amongst 100 French ladies who in 2018 wrote a newspaper column accusing the #Metoo marketing campaign of going too far.

“We defend a right to pester, which is vital to sexual freedom,” they mentioned. Earlier this month, public broadcaster France 2 ran a documentary, Depardieu: The Fall of an Ogre, which confirmed the actor making lewd feedback to ladies throughout a 2018 journey to North Korea and featured interviews with Arnould and one other actress, Helene Darras, who in September filed a lawsuit in opposition to Depardieu alleging sexual assault.

Berenice Hamidi, a lecturer on the Lumiere Lyon 2 college mentioned it was unsurprising the worldwide #Metoo motion was born out of the U.S. cinema business, the place she mentioned livelihoods may be precarious and the boundaries of truth and fiction blurred. “There is a real cultural exception in French cinema, which refuses to consider acts committed by artists as violence and to condemn them,” Hamidi advised franceinfo radio.

Depardieu advised RTL radio he thought of those that wrote this week’s open letter to be “very courageous”.

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