Pierre Lescure on Europe 1: "I didn't think I was president of the Cannes festival"

INTERVIEW

What is he doing here, the co-founder of Canal + and former boss of Paris Saint-Germain? Why has he held the position of President of the Cannes Film Festival since 2014? Basically, Pierre Lescure does not really know it himself. This is in any case what he entrusts to Michel Denisot on Europe 1, in the program

. On the occasion of the opening of the 74th Cannes Film Festival, the man of media and cinema opens up about his role at the head of this prestigious event, which he did not plan to lead one day.

"I did not think I was president" of the Cannes festival, explains Pierre Lescure, questioned on the roots of this ambition.

For him, who likes to "do" in life, "the president, it is not that he does nothing, but there is a side of 'symbolic authority'. 'I am the reference and I am the guardian of the temple.'

Thierry Frémaux makes the selection and a lot of things and brilliantly. So I didn't think of that. "

Audrey Hepburn's "Grace"

And yet, it is he who succeeded Gilles Jacob after the 2014 edition. "I had not thought of it, it was a beautiful gift", tells Michel Denisot today the one who is also the chronicler. from

on France 5.

>> Find all of Michel Denisot's interviews every Saturday at 8.45am on Europe 1 as well as in podcast and replay here

In this interview, Pierre Lescure also talks about his long-standing admiration for Audrey Hepburn.

"It really marked me as a young man. I fell in love with her when I saw her first film,

. (…) I found that she personified grace. This young woman had a crazy talent. , an absolute grace and all her life is a grace, until the end when she fights against cancer and does not pretend to be an ambassador for Unicef. When I was a kid, I said to myself 'I have learned that she was not very happy in her life, we are only 16 years apart, I will meet her one day and she will be happy '. Well, it did not happen like that. "

Money and the media

The former boss of Canal + also delivers his perspective on the evolution of the world of journalism, marked according to him by the decline in political influence and the rise of that of money. "At the time, politicians picked up their phones before 1981 and called" media executives, "he says. "Today, obviously, we know it everywhere, in radio as in TV, but not that, it is the money which holds the media. It is less good because politically, there is always a opposition which can be internal or external to criticize the way in which politicians deal with the media. However, we cannot fight against money. We are necessarily beaten, "concludes the journalist bitterly.