The first part of the French series
Mixte
is available this Monday on Amazon Prime Video.
Created by Marie Roussin (
Les Bracelets Rouges, Un Village Français
), this series follows the introduction of diversity in a French high school in the early 1960s through the double prism of the establishment's staff and a group of high school students. .
If the series takes place in the France of
Salut les Copains,
its words echo “contemporary social news”.
A singular, refreshing and liberating nugget! Welcome to the Lycée Voltaire, for the start of the 1963 school year, the lycée in the small town of Saint-Jean-d'Angély in Charente-Maritime is welcoming girls to its enclosure for the first time. There are eleven for hundreds of boys, and it's a mess.
Mixed
, available this Monday on Amazon Prime Video, tells the story of the introduction of coeducation in high schools in Gaullist France in the early 1960s through the double prism of the establishment's staff and a group of high school students, an event which foreshadows the sexual and societal revolution of May 1968. Why is this series, at the crossroads of teen-show and family comedy, so deeply relevant?
The designer Marie Roussin (
Les Bracelets Rouges,
Un Village Français
) had the idea for this fiction after reading an article "in which an establishment told of its pride in having been the first high school in the whole department to have become mixed at the start. from the 1960s, ”she told
20 Minutes
.
"This cohabitation of men and women has never been considered"
And to continue: “We don't really know this story.
I did some research and realized that this had been a huge revolution, both educationally and sociologically.
"
The mix has been totally “improvised”.
“It was done in small amounts, each headmaster decided what he wanted to do.
This cohabitation of men and women has never been considered, ”explains the screenwriter.
At the Lycée Voltaire, the decision of the principal, Mr. Jacquet (François Rollin) is not unanimous, starting with the general supervisor, Paul Bellanger (Pierre Deladonchamps), and raises many concerns.
The lack of preparation is obvious: the opportunity for quite funny sequences like when teachers are forced to give up their toilets to high school girls because no convenience has been provided for them.
"To stand in front of all the boys"
Michèle (Léonie Souchaud) arrives in the high school of her brother, Jean-Pierre, to the chagrin of the latter.
“He wants to get as close as possible to social norms, analyzes his interpreter, Baptiste Masseline.
He has to hold the ranks a bit in front of all the boys when his sister arrives in high school.
He wants to protect the image of his family and his own.
He puts a lot of pressure on himself ”.
As soon as she arrives, Michèle becomes friends with the playful Pied-Noir, Simone.
"There are plenty of things that echo in their relationship with Vic and Pénélope in
La Boum
", summarizes Anouk Villemin.
Will this friendship hold while Simone has a crush on Jean-Pierre and his false airs of Alain Delon?
"Talking about relationships between men and women today"
In the courtyard, the boys have eyes only for the beautiful and brilliant Annick, bandeau in the hair à la Brigitte Bardot, sixties oblige.
“Men always put her back in the place of a beautiful woman.
The lines they send her like "Smile, you're prettier like that", these are phrases that I have been told and that I have heard addressed to other women, "comments Lula Cotton-Frappier.
If the series takes place in the France of
Salut les Copains,
its words echo “contemporary social news”.
“The ambition is to talk about the relationship between men and women today,” explains the screenwriter.
Mixed
depicts a deeply patriarchal society, which is not unlike
Mad Men.
"The boys also suffer from the overwhelming patriarchy"
“Sexism persists even though in appearances everything has changed,” says the creator of
Mixte
.
“We don't have the same dresses anymore, the same crass thoughts, but in the end, easy girls still exist, just like the alpha male as a masculine ideal and the difficulty for a man not to correspond to this cliché.
The boys also suffer from overwhelming patriarchy, ”she recalls.
The mockery fuse thus towards the sensitive Pichon.
“It is modern and avant-garde.
The girls do not bother him and do not shock him, because he grew up with three sisters ”, relates the one who embodies him, Nathan Parent.
The reports are not simple either on the side of the staff of the Lycée Voltaire.
Paul Bellanger, disturbed by the arrival of the new and lovely English teacher, Miss Couret (Nina Meurisse), hastens to tell him that he is married to the school nurse, the mysterious Jeanne Bellanger (Maud Wyler ).
“Each character has a kind of groundswell, destroying a stereotype by experiencing it for themselves.
Casually,
Mixte
twists its neck to many sexist principles, ”says Maud Wyler.
While remaining funny, tender and captivating!
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