Place des grands hommes...

I was watching some YouTube videos about David Tennant, the guy from Dr Who, and I was thinking that every country has got some people like that: He's mostly well known in Britain (or so he was until the new series of Dr Who got really successful), but there, everybody knows him. And they're lucky. I found some people like that in France, but you couldn't always say we are lucky to know them. For example Johnny Hallyday, a really really successful American-rocker-wannabe. (I've never been able to figure out wether he was French or Belgian by the way. I think he's a bit of both, but I remember hearing him say he never had the Belgian nationality. I don't really know. And I don't really care). I could live without Johnny Hallyday. Wouldn't be too bad.

But on the other hand, we also have people that are only well known in France, and that's a pity for you guys who do not have the pleasure of being French :D So here you go, reader... I made another top 5... (Oh, yeah, and this time, there's not classification whatsoever. I just wrote things in the order they came up...)

1. Michel Denisot. The best talk show host in the world, if you ask me. Which you didn't. I don't care, I'm still telling you. He's brilliant, he's got opinions, but do not impose them on the people he's talking to, he asks honest questions you'd like to have the answer too, without trying to make people say what he wants to hear. He's brilliant, and so is his show. (Le Grand Journal de Canal+). I'm afraid Michel Denisot doesn't really qualify to enter this top 5, because he's not quite famous enough but he's so good that I couldn't not put him in.

2. Jean Jacques Goldman. He's the ultimate French singer. He's writing nice lyrics, maybe not overly original, but very rarely silly, and he looks so nice you wish he were your friend. I think Germans have their own Jean Jacques Goldman, named "Herbert Grönemeyer". But I'm not sure, because I think Grönemeyer might have a little more rocky touch, whereas Goldman... Well what Goldman does can only be described as "Frech variety"...

3. Jean Rochefort. He's fun, he's old, and yet he's not annoying, he played in good movies, and he still does, he doesn't constantly name drop (Ah, "I remember when Gabin told me that", or "Romy Schneider was such a sweety". Mostly with people who can't come and say "I might have been a sweety, but you were the most dreadful, self-loving bore I ever got to meet".) He's not afraid of playing in some weird new-wave movies, and he's very funny.

4. Phew this is getting tough... At this point the people I would like to put in are either not well known enough, or simply already well known abroad... Getting a little difficult, really... Well, I guess this is just going to be a top three then... No, no, I guess I should be writing Jael Debouze down. He's fun, he's brilliant, and he is a reference. The funny little guy from the suburb. And yet he does get a message through, about the French society and all. Yeah, Jamel would be in ther. Funny how I haven't found any women I could write down... I'm sure there must be at least one...

5. Well then OK, Christine Ockrent. She's a journalist too. She's really good. She's funny, but always serious, she's intelligent and intellactual, but without being incomprehensible, and she often deals with interesting issues. She's very much pro-Europe, and she's extremely well known (she hosted the daily news for quite a while.)

Well, here you go, reader, my so-so-list-of-the-5-French-people-they-would-be-sorry-not-to-have,-abroad,-if-they-only-knew-they-existed. Any suggestions from the French people here?