Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu, this “Free Frenchwoman” who illuminates “Emily in Paris”
“If there’s one character we wish we had the guts, it’s Sylvie, not Emily,” slice it Los Angeles Times. In a long portrait of the French actress Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu, alias Sylvie Grateau on the screen, the American daily is passionate about the one who, according to him, embodies a certain idea of the free French woman.
At the head of a luxury marketing agency, Sylvie Grateau is the head, as ruthless as she is fascinating, of Emily (Lily Collins), a young American parachuted into Paris and heroine of the phenomenon series Emily in Paris. It is both the actress and her chic Parisian character who fascinate the Los Angeles Times.
Refined and elegant
In season 3, on Netflix since December 21, Sylvie Grateau rebels against the American multinational which owns her agency and decides to set up her own structure.
For the Californian daily, she is the most interesting character in the series because “both feared and adored, she excels in her work, without letting her career make her forget who she really is”. She “embodies the refinement and blasé elegance of the French woman par excellence”, insists the newspaper.
It is also the representation of a woman over 50 fulfilled in her love and sexual life that captivates the American public.
Asked by the daily, Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu returns to a scene during which her character runs naked with one of her lovers in lavender fields, reporting what director Darren Star told her:
“Do you know what French women can teach us? Freedom.”
For the actress, her character “knows who she is” and “doesn’t care what anyone thinks of her”.
A career rebound
the Los Angeles Times is also interested in the career of the French actress, who rebounds at 59 years old. Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu draws a parallel between the career of Sylvie Grateau in this series, which “shows the power of a woman of a certain age, who has reached a stage in her career where she is no longer afraid to take risks”, and his own destiny.
After quite hollow years, the actress, revealed in 1985 with the comedy three men and a basket, took the risk of auditioning at over 50 for this role originally planned for a 30-year-old. Successful bet since Emily in Paris Today, she is the perfect incarnation, in the United States, of the free and emancipated Parisian woman.
