- Rooney Mara, Pan, 2015. The casting of the white Mara as the Native American Tiger Lily led to an enormous public row with Warner Bros. The succulent new French find, Bollywood’s Pooja Hegde and the 13 Years A Slave support-Oscar winner, Lupita Nyong’o, were in UK director Joe Wright’s loop. Mara later bravely told the UK’s Telegraph that she regretted playing the Native American character. Never again, she vowed. It was good that Adèle escaped the controversy… as the enchanting 2012 French revelation of La vie d’Adele/Blue is the Warmest Colour went on into The Last Face and Bastille Day opposite, respectively, Javier Bardem and Idris Elba.
- Marion Cotillard, Allied, 2016. Spies in love. During WWII. Sounds better than it turned out. On the suggestion list for Brad Pitt’s lover, were the top French suspects. Exarchopoulos (too young for Brad and too busy in films with Javier Bardem, Idris Elba), Cotillard’s usual deputy, Bérénice Bejo, Tarantino favourite Mélanie Laurent, Léa Seydoux, Mélanie Thierry. And three ex-Canal Plus TV weather girls, actresses all, performing sketches, jokes, japes, before the weather forecast and winning films galore as a result: Louise Bourgoin (16 movies in seven), Canadian Charlotte Le Bon (16 in nine), Pauline Lefèvre and, the most talented, Doria Tellier… she wrote her own film, Monsieur et Madame Adelmann, 2016.
Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls: 2