Actor-director Daniel Auteuil and key “Emilia Perez” collaborator Jean-Baptiste Pouilloux have set up their next features with Les Films Velvet, the auteur-focused production outfit behind this year’s Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Paris opener “The Musicians” as well as Rebecca Zlotowski’s upcoming, Jodie Foster-led thriller “Vie Privée.”
After last year’s Cannes-launched legal thriller “An Ordinary Case,” Auteuil will step back behind the camera for the World War II drama “Une Nuit” (“One Night”). Co-written by Auteuil and filmmaker Camille Lugan (“The Book of Joy”), the film follows the incredible true story of a 1942 effort to rescue more then one hundred Jewish children from a deportation camp just outside of Lyon. Les Films Velvet’s Frederic Jouve will produce alongside Adrien Nussenbaum.
An in-demand assistant director who has worked closely with Jacques Audiard, Zlotowski and Nadav Lapid, Pouilloux most recently led second unit on “Emilia Perez” before directing the Canal Plus series “Iris.” The filmmaker will make his feature debut with “Merci Maman” (“Thanks Mom”), an irreverent comedy, written by Pouilloux, about a mother who drags her son to couple’s therapy. The project is currently casting, with production slated for later this year.
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Velvet is also gearing up to shoot comedian Charlotte Gabris’ directorial debut “Au Frais.” Co-produced with Marine Alaric of Orta Films, the comic feature follows a 38-year-old woman dumped by her boyfriend and then sent by her worried family to freeze her eggs in Barcelona.
Further down the line, Velvet is developing new features from Thierry de Peretti (“In His Own Image”), Guillaume Renusson (“White Paradise”) and Farid Bentoumi (“Red Soil”), as well as the Amazon series “Glam Squad,” created by Zlotowski and Olivier Nicklaus.
That nearly all the aforementioned filmmakers have worked with Les Films Velvet before is a point of pride for Jouve, who believes above all in “nurturing” his stable of auteurs.
“It’s fundamental to think long-term,” Jouve tells Variety. “Careers are built over multiple films, so I’m less interested in making a one-off hit and more focused on developing filmmakers, thinking long-term, and growing together. Rebecca Zlotowski is a perfect example. We’ve made six films together — all the way from her very first — and we’re already working on more.”