FRANCE-AGGRESSION – TELAM Agency
The French actress and director Maïwenn, of a very high profile recently as her next film, “Jeanne du Barry”, was not only chosen to open the Cannes Film Festival in May but will also mark Johnny Depp’s return to the screen after the scandalous dispute with her ex-partner, she was sued by a journalist whom she allegedly attacked in a restaurant.
As detailed by the specialized site Variety, although the news began to circulate now after Maïwenn’s film was announced for the 76th. edition of the great French film festival, the complaint dates from March 7.
According to that report, the incident occurred at the end of February and had as its alleged victim Edwy Plenel, editor-in-chief of the independent information site Mediapart, according to the news channel BFM TV.
Plenel assured that he was in a restaurant in the VII arrondissement of Paris while the director ate alone at a nearby table. Always according to her version, at one point Maïwenn approached him and, without saying a word, took him by the hair, spat in his face and stormed out of the place.
The speculation of French journalism is that the attack is linked to the fact that Mediapart, one of the main promoters of the #MeToo movement in that country, was the first media outlet to publicize the testimony (later dismissed by the courts) of the actress Belgian-Dutch Sand Van Roy in which he accused the renowned film director Luc Besson, Maïwenn’s ex-husband, of rape.
Besson, who at the age of 31 began a relationship with a 15-year-old Maïwenn – the age of legal consent in France – and with whom he became a father a year later, had several complaints of harassment and inappropriate sexual conduct in recent years.
The director expressed on several occasions that she felt distant from #MeToo, and in fact hired Depp for “Jeanne du Barry” when the American actor was still going through the publicized legal battle with his ex, Amber Heard.
The film is a period story in which Depp plays King Louis XVI and deals with his relationship with the working-class young woman of the title -played by Maïwenn- who rises in the social hierarchies to become the monarch’s favourite.
Source: Ambito
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
