Jane Birkin

Jane Birkin is an English actress, singer, songwriter, and model.

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  • Along with a prolific career in British and French cinema, Birkin is also known for her decade-long musical and romantic partnership with Serge Gainsbourg.

    A native of London, Birkin began her career as an actress, appearing in minor roles in Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blowup (1966), and Kaleidoscope (1966). In 1968, she met Serge Gainsbourg while co-starring with him in Slogan, which marked the beginning of a years-long working and personal relationship. The duo released their debut album Jane Birkin/Serge Gainsbourg (1969), and Birkin also appeared in the controversial film Je t’aime moi non plus (1976) under Gainsbourg’s direction. Birkin would attain further acting credits in Agatha Christie’s films Death on the Nile (1978), and Evil Under the Sun (1982). After separating from Gainsbourg in 1980, Birkin continued to work as both an actress and a singer, appearing in various independent films and recording numerous solo albums.

Charlotte Gainsbourg

Charlotte Gainsbourg is a French musician, singer and actress, and the daughter of Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin.

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  • Charlotte Gainsbourg boasts an illustrious acting career. Since the age of 14 she has worked with numerous renowned French and international directors such as Claude Miller, Agnès Varda, Lars VonTrier and Michel Gondry. Charlotte Gainsbourg has won several prestigious awards, including two César Awards and one Palme d’Or for Best Actress at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival for the film Antichrist.

    Charlotte Gainsbourg is also an accomplished musician and renowned singer. She has released five albums in French and in English. In 2018, she was crowned Female artist of the year at the French Victoires de la Musique.

    She relocated to New York City five years ago.

    Learn more at charlottegainsbourg.com

Rebecca Marder

A French theater and film actress, Rebecca Marder, performed in La Comédie française’s show Les Serges and the show’s film adaptation La Comédie-Française chante Gainsbourg.

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  • Rebecca Marder started her career at the age of five, performing alongside Louis Garrel and Mélanie Laurent, in Rodolphe Marconi’s feature film Ceci est mon corps. While still in high school, she played Emma in Alain Tasma’s eponymous film, for which she won a prize at the La Rochelle Film Festival.

    At the age of 19, the head of French National theater Comédie Française, Eric Ruf, snatched her out of her theater conservatory Theatre National de Strasbourg, where she had just begun studying. She made her theater debut playing Lucietta in Carlo Goldoni’s The Boors and was soon after entrusted with many roles in the classical and contemporary repertoires (Molière, Racine, Feydeau, Lagarce) – amongst which that of Serge Gainsbourg in Les Serge.

    She has worked with a great number of theater directors amongst which are Ivo Von Hove, Clément Hervieu Léger, Julie Deliquet… While a theater actress, Rebecca Marder continues to shoot films. The more recent ones are Fiertés, a series directed by Philippe Faucon for ARTE, Un homme pressé (Hervé Mimran), La Daronne (Jean-Paul Salomé, with Isabelle Huppert), Deux Moi (Cedric Klapish, with Anna Girardot), and Arnaud Desplechin’s soon to be released Tromperies (with Léa Seydoux and Denis Podalydès).

    She holds the lead roles in the much-awaited movies: Simone, Voyage du siècle, a biopic by La Mome‘s director Olivier Dahan about the life of French figure Simone Veil; as well as Sandrine Kiberlain’s first feature film, Une jeune fille qui va bien. She is currently shooting two more title roles with directors Michel Leclerc, and Noemie Lvovsky, both musicals. In summer 2021, she will shoot a French thriller directed by Sylvain Desclous, alongside Benjamin Lavernhe.

Michael Cooper

Michael Cooper is a deputy culture editor at The New York Times. He was previously a reporter covering classical music and dance, politics, urban affairs, New York, crime and general mayhem. He will moderate the talk.