As Call My Agent: Bollywood releases, a look back at the original French series that showed stardom isn't all that glitters

Self-deprecation in stardom is an anomaly, if there ever was one. But have we all not wondered what goes on with our stars after the director yells "cut?" Do they feel exhausted and exhilarated like we do? How are they at their weakest? What do their dreams look like? Or nightmares?

The film industry, irrespective of its geography, is a well-oiled machine that works tirelessly so that we never find these answers, while making sure that we never stop wondering. When Call My Agent!, originally titled Dix Pour Cent (Ten Percent), broke out on French television screens in 2015, it was just the kind of grand, behind-the-scenes peek that we did not know we needed. Within just a season of its release, the French dramedy catapulted to a cult status, as it broke down, in a hilarious and often satirical fashion, the insurmountable wall between the image of a star and the real person behind it.

The show, often classified as a workplace drama (I feel it is so much more), follows the goings on in a premium Parisian talent agency titled Agence Samuel Kerr (ASK), as it traces the lives of its key agents and their assistants, whose clientele includes some of the biggest names in French cinema. It is a dog-eat-dog world, where these agents can be as compassionate as conniving, or as maternal as manipulative, depending on the need of the hour. They are passionate workaholics, who will do all it takes to either get things done or stop them from happening.

 The four agents, Andrea Martel (Camille Cottin), Mathias Barneville (Thibault de Montalembert), Gabriel Sarda (Gregory Montel), and Arlette Azemar (Liliane Rovere) represent different temperaments – a mercurial Andrea, slimy-as-a-snake Mathias, an emotional and sensitive Gabriel, and the ‘been-there-seen-it-all’ Arlette. When the agency’s founding father Samuel Kerr dies on vacation after swallowing a wasp, his proteges are left to scramble around to keep their heads above water, while cleaning after their late boss’s suddenly exposed illicit shenanigans.

But the show must go on and it does. Call My Agent! is the first show of its kind that brings together these fictional agents with real stars, who either play exaggerated versions of themselves or their colleagues in the industry. The co-creator of the show, Dominique Besnehard, an actor and director himself, aside from having been one of France’s most celebrated agents, has admittedly drawn from his own stories. He has said in his interviews that almost all celebrity instances we see on the show are real, even when they do not match the star that is acting them out. There is an actor who cannot swim, an actor who cannot drive, an actor who cannot stop acting, and even an actor who suddenly cannot act. It is a treat to watch France’s finest, Isabelle Huppert, Juliette Binoche, Cecile de France, Fabrice Luchini, Jean Dujardin, and Isabelle Adjani, light up the screens, not as stars but as real people with follies, insecurities, and vulnerabilities.

 Dujardin cannot break character after playing a Revenant-like role, months after wrap-up, and his agent Andrea has to literally strip him off his period-costume (that is now literally second skin to him), so that he can play a clean-shaven banker in his next. Later, he bites his producer’s dog. Cecile de France battles the dilemma of whether to botox or not to botox, even as she takes horse-riding lessons after lying to Quentin Tarantino about her equestrian prowess. But eventually, she gets dropped because 'she is too old for the part.' Huppert mocks her own reputation as a workaholic, as we see her juggle two schedules in one night. In the third season, we join Monica Bellucci in her search for a “normal man who does his own laundry, and drives his own car” – after three weeks of being single. Given the actress’s forever interesting and very public private life, the joke is not lost on us. That these actors are all in on the joke – is the masterstroke of the show.

Stardom here is not all that glitters, but the problem to fix. And the agents are the troubleshooters. 

Theirs is a job in the shadows, working behind the scenes, protecting little big secrets to preserve the sensitivity of the artists, all for that ‘ten percent’ commission. And when the lying gets too much, they pay the price too. There is an element of French absurdism that rears its head now and again only to create comedy gold. A self-assured workaholic lesbian getting pregnant, after a drunken threesome, for instance, is perhaps incredulous even by French standards. But no matter how absurd certain plot points get, the writing is so sharp and light and warm, and the performances so convincing, that you want to be a part of it.

Another aspect that sets the show apart, is that despite all the celebrity meat it comes packed with, it never gets gossipy. There is a rare emotional depth with which the agents handle these artists, and in doing so, the sensitivity they display forms the tender core of the series. The premise may be predictable but the way it handles ‘fame’ is anything but. It is as soapy as it is serious; and it is too self-aware to be self-indulgent.

At the heart of all its brilliance lies a supremely talented ensemble cast. Camille Cottin, who plays Andrea, is the reason to watch the show. As the seasons progress, she pretty much becomes the most central character. A force of nature, Andrea goes from whispering to mercurial in a second, she is a passionate lover to Colette (Ophelia Kolb), and an exhausted mother to their daughter Flora, and most of all, a shrewd and devoted agent to her clients. Cottin makes every shade of Andrea a delight to watch, especially when she struts around in her stilettos and sleek semi-formals.

Montel brings a bumbling and confusing energy to his Gabriel; his episode with Bellucci is my personal favourite. It takes great craft to make something so bizarre seem so relatable, you almost live the conflict of the characters. Then there is Mathias, who on paper, would sound nothing short of creepy – a middle-aged man with a hidden illegitimate daughter, one who sleeps with his secretary and also appears to love his wife – he is all about secrets and coverups. Montalembert, who plays this character, brings in a certain gravitas and sincerity to the role that makes it impossible to hate him, even when he is at his scheming best.

 The second-generation (of agents) is well represented by Camille (Fanny Sidney), Herve (Nicolas Maury), and Noemie (Laure Calamy). These assistants are as much a part of the show as their bosses, and each of them enjoy well-defined character arcs that only get more potent as the seasons progress.

Unlike Emily In Paris, Call My Agent! does not make Paris look like a road-side coffee and croissants dreamland with the Eiffel Tower gleaming in the backdrop. The show strips the city off its cliches – Paris is almost incidental to the scheme of things. It is a city of dreams, yes, but many a nightmare must be lived through to live a dream. Although heightening the French mood is a sweetly melancholic background score that never really leaves your head. Given the formulaic mode of the show, it lends itself to many remakes, several of which are under production around the world.

Closer home, the Indian version is ready for release, and I’m eager to see how the show takes off from French shores to grow a desi heart. A key challenge for the makers would have been to balance the drama with the realism, keeping things from turning too soppy and caricatured. Also, in a society riddled with taboo, where chai is served with a side of salacious blind items, can the remake go beyond the ‘gossip’ appeal? It will also be interesting to see how far our Bollywood actors bare their weak spots, and not just for comic relief, like they sometimes do in award functions. But if they do, will the show be able to treat this with an empathetic gaze? And how will the French absurdism morph into its Bollywood counterpart?At its heart, Call My Agent! is a love letter to the business of cinema – binding the worlds of those who live in the shadows with those that thrive under the lights. It is a series that had its head and heart in the right place, right from the start till the finale. Anyone attempting to touch it, should do so with warmth and wit, with a genuine affection for its characters. Only then, will they be able to take it over the finish line.

So Can Call My Agent: Bollywood do what celeb interviews have not done yet — humanise our stars? Fingers crossed.

Call My Agent: Bollywood will premiere on 29 October on Netflix India.

 

Kusumita Das is a freelance journalist from India currently living in Jerusalem. She writes on cinema, culture and travel, and in her free time tries to string together sentences in Hebrew.

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