Noémie Merlant: In the Spotlight

This article was published in Mastermind 14, May 2023. Purchase all issues here.

As a child, Noémie Merlant sang, danced and dreamed while watching Moulin Rouge and Titanic. Today, she shares the screen with the likes of Cate Blanchett and Kit Harington. After winning a César award this past February for her supporting role in Louis Garrel’s L’Innocent (The Innocent), Merlant will soon star in director Audrey Diwan’s Emmanuelle, and she is preparing to direct her second film, following her debut Mi iubita, mon amour in 2021.

Merlant has come a long way, from a difficult beginning as a model to her current successful film career. Since starring in Céline Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire in 2019, Merlant seems to be in tune with the world around her. Her life and work revolve around the issues of a patriarchal society: power, feminism, gender, inclusion and activism. No matter whom she works with – Jacques Audiard (Les Olympiades/Paris, 13th District), Marie-Castille Mention-Schaar (A Good Man), Todd Field (Tár), André Téchiné (Les âmes sœurs/Soul Mates) or Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache (Une année difficile/A Difficult Year) – her films, characters and performances always make people think and get them talking and debating.

Do you like to talk?

NOÉMIE MERLANT No, not really, and I’ve been this way since I was a child – my father was already saying that when I was eight years old. Interviews, for example, were very hard for me at the beginning, although it’s gotten easier over time. I don’t like the idea that you have to immediately have a clear, precise opinion about things, a definite point of view. Things are much more fluid – you can change your mind, evolve.

That’s odd. We thought that you loved a good debate.

NM I don’t look for a debate at all costs . Sometimes I prefer to just listen. And not necessarily to someone speaking – I listen to music, to life, to silence.

Isabelle Huppert says that she doesn’t have a “master-pupil” relationship with directors. She feels like their equal.

NM I feel the same way. There is a conductor, someone who gets things rolling, but we are not puppets. In the creative process, everyone must have their own place and contribute their ideas. When you are just starting out, however, and you are a woman, it’s not always easy to find your place.

Isn’t that also a question of consent? Is there a kind of misunderstanding today between the younger generation and the old guard, whose certainties have been shaken?

NM Yes, without a doubt. I sometimes hear people say things like, “We can’t do or say anything today – there’s a lack of freedom in the creative process.” For those who acted badly, no doubt that’s true, but for everyone else, it’s the opposite: what freedom! New ways open up new perspectives, inspire the imagination. Before I worked with an “intimacy coordinator” [the person who facilitates communication between a director and the actors for scenes involving nudity, kissing, sex, etc.], I wondered about it. Now I have no doubt. The intimacy coordinator is there to supervise. On a shoot, sex scenes are often not well prepared, and they worry the actors. An actor might be touched by someone without warning, for example. But if an actor is warned in advance and knows exactly where they are going to be touched, in such and such a place, and why, they feel safe and can put more into it.

Do you talk much on a film shoot?

NM Not very much. I really need to concentrate and go into my bubble. But since I’m afraid of looking like a “bitch” or of ruining the atmosphere, I sometimes force myself to speak. On the set of Louis Garrel’s L’Innocent, for example, I didn’t need to concentrate too much because my character spoke loudly and took up lots of space, so that was my attitude on the set, so I could maintain the same level of energy. Some actors manage to switch easily from their role to themselves, but I can’t. The energy of my character affects my energy on set, and it even rubs off on my life. When I’m making a film, my friends often say to me, “You’re not here with us.”

How did you behave on the set of Tár with Cate Blanchett? The film’s subject – creativity and power – is not exactly lightweight.

NM I was frightened by the film’s subject and by the big names I was working with. I felt like I shouldn’t take up too much space. But we filmed in an extremely healthy environment. Todd [Field] and Cate had thought a lot about it beforehand and had a positive attitude: “We are all equal, all artists, all free to propose ideas and to disagree.” There were no egos on the set, even though that’s what the film is about! We talked a lot about the subject afterward, when we met again with Cate and the director. We had great discussions about power dynamics and the creative process.

Do you think that different directors have different approaches, different ways of looking at things?

NM It depends. Sometimes I work with a “person.” Others are very quick to bring the notion of gender into play; more often they are men – that’s a fact. That doesn’t mean that women never abuse their power, as in Tár. Keeping a distance from gender allows us to focus only on power and its abuse. I can spot bad behavior, but I still have a hard time speaking up. I don’t always know how to handle it.

Where does your interest in topics like sisterhood and gender come from? From your younger days?

NM When I was younger, I didn’t ask myself these kinds of questions – quite the opposite. When I left home at 17 and fell into the world of modeling, it was a shock. I was confronted with certain behaviors that astounded me. I had some rather sordid experiences, without thinking about it. I’m not surprised that I gravitated toward acting. I became interested in these very contemporary subjects little by little. It was a journey, not a sudden realization, a mixture of personal advances and encounters: my friends, the #MeToo movement, psychoanalysis, the fact of questioning myself about my unhappiness. And meeting Céline Sciamma was decisive for my life and my career.

You became an actor by default?

NM It wasn’t my original idea. I wanted to sing. I wanted to be Céline Dion! I quickly realized that it was only a dream. Already at 14, I could no longer sing in front of people; it gave me no pleasure. I think I was always an actor at heart. My father saw it – he was the one who pushed me. He saw that I was full of life when I was creating something.

What made you want to direct?

NM It took me a long time to dare to try. First, I was “the model who wanted to be an actor” and who wasn’t always taken seriously. It was difficult to act on my desire to direct. But privately I was writing. I dreamed of stories that I couldn’t find in the roles I was offered, especially at the beginning. I am happy to be able to do both and to see that we are compartmentalizing people less and less.

What’s your next film about?

NM It’s a comedy about three friends who plan to liberate themselves together. For me, the real subject is, “How can we reconnect with our desires by getting rid of our traumas, anger and suffering?”