{"id":496623,"date":"2026-06-12T20:26:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T20:26:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/496623\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T20:26:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T20:26:09","slug":"emmanuelle-seigner-talks-loyalty-to-roman-polanski-rock-band-lepee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/496623\/","title":{"rendered":"Emmanuelle Seigner Talks Loyalty To Roman Polanski; Rock Band L\u2019Ep\u00e9e"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tWith a streak of blue in her blonde hair and a silver electric guitar pendant teamed with a flower print dress and sneakers, Emmanuelle Seigner<\/a> has an air of rock chick meets relaxed femininity as she sits down to talk to journalists at the Taormina<\/a> Film Festival.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe French actress is one of the guests of honor at the Italian film festival this year where she will be feted with an achievement award on Friday evening.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe electric guitar pendant is a nod to L\u2019Ep\u00e9e, Seigner\u2019s rock band with American music artist Anton Newcombe and husband-and-wife duo Marie and Lionel Limi\u00f1anas.<\/p>\n

\n\tAsked about the band\u2019s choice of name, which means sword in English, Seigner replies, drawing a finger across her neck: \u201cBecause the sword is used to ennoble (to knight) and to cut the throat\u201d.<\/p>\n

\n\tShe goes on to reveal proudly that the band \u2013 for which she is also the lyrics writer \u2013 has had tracks featured in Emily in Paris as well as Killing Eve.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhat I like about it is that nobody knows it\u2019s me so when we tour people ask me, \u2018Are you L\u2019Ep\u00e9e\u2026 I like to be unknown,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\n\tGranddaughter of acclaimed late Com\u00e9die-Fran\u00e7aise actor Louis Seigner, the actress has acting in her blood. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter growing up in theater and a stint as a model, she got her first significant big screen break in Jean-Luc Godard\u2019s Detective in 1985, followed by Roman Polanski<\/a>\u2019s psychological thriller Frantic opposite Harrison Ford in 1988.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMy grandfather was kind of a French Laurence Olivier. He was with the Com\u00e9die Fran\u00e7aise for 40 years. I was raised in theatre. I was a model at the beginning, and then I met Godard in a hotel, and he asked me to be in his movie and that\u2019s how I started,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe experience was not an easy one for Seigner who played a character called the Princess of the Bahamas.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cHe was always changing everything, but it was fun. There are worse things in life,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\n\tFrantic changed her life. As well as putting her on the map as an actress internationally, \u00a0she also married Polanski in 1989.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeigner has since appeared in half a dozen of Polanski\u2019s films spanning Bitter Moon (1992), The Ninth Gate (1999), Venus in Fur (2013), Based On A True Story (2017) and An Officer and a Spy (2019), while also working with the likes of Claude Miller (The Smile), Olivier Dahan (La Vie en Rose), Mario Monicelli (Dark Illness), Julian Schnabel (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, At Eternity\u2019s Gate), Gabriele Salvatores (Nirvana), Giovanni Veronesi (Witches to the North) and Dario Argento (Giallo) among others.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn recent years, however, her public persona has been engulfed in the controversy around a historic rape charge in the U.S. against Polanski involving then teenager Samantha Geimer, as well as multiple allegations of sexual misconduct in France, all of which he has denied.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeigner has remained loyal to her husband of more than 35-years throughout the period, which has seen him kicked out of the The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) and effectively made persona non grata at France\u2019s C\u00e9sar Academy.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeigner even connected with Geimer in 2023 for an interview in France\u2019s Le Point<\/a> magazine in which the latter denied that she was a victim and that she had long forgiven Polanski.<\/p>\n

\n\tGeimer\u2019s memoir The Girl: A Life in the Shadow of Roman Polanski<\/a>, focusing on the how the furore around the case, rather than the assault itself, has impacted her life, is currently being adapted to the big screen, with C\u00e9sar\u2013nominated French filmmaker Marina Ziolkowski directing.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeigner shuts down any discussion of that film or Polanski in the Taormina roundtable, saying politely but firmly: \u201c I don\u2019t want to talk about that. It\u2019s not my story.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tPushed on whether, like Geimer, her life has been impacted by events beyond her control, and how she deals with the fallout, Seigner simply reaffirms her commitment to Polanski.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019m loyal to him because he\u2019s been a very good husband and a very good father and a very good man,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeigner does not rule out working again with her husband, who turns 93 in August, but her response implies nothing is on the boil.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWho knows, maybe, he\u2019s one of the greatest directors in the world,\u201d she says on a possible collaboration with the Oscar and Palme d\u2019Or The Pianist director. <\/p>\n

\n\tIn the meantime, she is busy with a raft of other projects including a new L\u2019Ep\u00e9e album, and three feature films in France, Italy<\/a> and the U.S. in the pipeline, the details of which she is keeping under wraps.<\/p>\n

\n\tHer last feature film credit was Olmo Schnabel\u2019s New York-set Pet Shop Days alongside Willem Dafoe, which had a limited release after debuting in Venice in 2023.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI have a working visa, and I love working there and I love American people. I love working with American directors,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\n\tShe also appeared in play Bungalow 51, starring as Marilyn Monroe opposite her sister Mathilde Seigner as Simone Signoret. The work is inspired by an infamous incident in which Signoret\u2019s husband Yves Montand cheated on her with Monroe while shooting Let\u2019s Make Love in Hollywood in 1960.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlongside her own plans, Seigner also talks proudly about her oldest daughter Morgane Polanski<\/a>, who has accompanied her to Taormina. The actress and filmmaker is preparing her first feature film, a horror movie, in the UK, where she has lived since studying at The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cShe has done three shorts,\u201d said Seigner, adding her daughter had asked her to read the first draft of the screenplay and is now pestering her to read the final version. \u00a0\u201cShe\u2019s got a very good eye\u2026 since she was a child she was doing shows and directing plays. I think it\u2019s something you have in you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLooking back at her life and career as receives an achievement award in Taormina, Seigner said she had few regrets bar one.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMaybe I would be a more careerist, I was not career minded. I really didn\u2019t care\u2026 maybe if I was 20 again, I would be more ambitious\u2026 I guess I was lucky, but I was never ambitious. Now, I\u2019m more ambitious, but it\u2019s a bit too late\u2026 I can pray.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With a streak of blue in her blonde hair and a silver electric guitar pendant teamed with a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":496624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[321,212814,93,61,60,102,212815,34513,212816,212817],"class_list":["post-496623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-emmanuelle-seigner","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-italy","tag-morgane-polanski","tag-roman-polanski","tag-taormina","tag-taormina-film-festival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=496623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/496624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=496623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=496623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=496623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}