L'Auberge Espagnole The Movie in Sacramento, CA

• Info
• Cast & Crew

• Genre: Comedy
  
  Release Date: -0/16/2003
  Running Time: 122
  
  Rating: R - Restricted
  
  http://www.foxsearchlight.com/lauberge/
  
• Cast:
  Romain Duris, Judith Godrèche, Audrey Tautou, Kelly Reilly, Kevin Bishop, Federico D'Anna, Barnaby Metschurat, Christian Pagh, Xavier De Guillebon, Wladimir Yordanoff, Iddo Goldberg
  
  Crew:
  Director - Cédric Klapisch, Writer - Cédric Klapisch, Producer - Bruno Levy, Co-Producer - Mate Cantero, Co-Producer - Stephane Sorlat, Co-Producer - Julio Fernandez, Production Designer - François Emmanuelli, Director of Photography - Dominique Colin, Film Editor - Francine Sandberg, Music - Loik Dury
  
  Production Companies:
  Bac Films, France 2 Cinema, Le Studio Canal +
  
  Distributors:
  Fox
  
  Notes:
  -Notes provided by Fox Searchlight- DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT The idea for L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE came to me about 10 years ago. My sister was attending the "Erasmus" exchange program in Barcelona, and when I went to visit her for a week, I found her sharing an apartment with five other roommates, every single one of whom was from a different country. When I saw how funny and rich this situation was dramatically, it inspired me to make a movie out of it. At the time I had been working for two years on the script for a heist movie. Everything was set to go when production had to be delayed four months. I decided to see if I could make another movie while I was waiting, figuring that if I could write a project in two weeks, it would be possible. I sat at my desk and 12 days later finished L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. Along with Bruno Levy, the producer, and Romain Duris, the actor who I always wanted to play Xavier (we had already worked together four times), I traveled around Europe looking for the cast. We went to Copenhagen, Rome, London, Berlin and Barcelona, meeting about 20 actors in each location. For each character, I wrote a little "rehearsal scene," and as we went along, these auditions became new scenes in the film. Throughout the process, I was rewriting the script and reinventing the characters based on ideas that the actors inspired in me. Indeed, the plot of the film seemed to arise out of the people I met. Usually I work, like most writers, in the opposite way: creating characters and then seeking out actors to embody them. But, in this case, it seemed important to do it the other way around. For one thing, I didn't want to make caricatures of any European culture. So, for example, instead of writing "the perfect Italian character," I met Federico D'Anna, who I found to be very Italian in his own individually unique way, and he became "the Italian character" in the movie. Barcelona also affected the script, because as I searched the city for locations, many scenes came into my imagination just by discovering a very special place. The script was consciously constructed like a melting pot made up of dreams, memories, images, environments and stories told to me by Erasmus students. This "jam" became L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. I think the tone of the movie expresses the confusion of that time when you are 25 years old and you're not really sure what you want to do with your life, who to fall in love with, if you should be going to college or learning about life in some other way. That time is often a mess, in a sense, and with Xavier, I tried to express this messiness in a light and comic way. It seemed that as I made the movie, I learned, along with Xavier, that following the most unconscious desires and mixed-up impulses is a good way to grow up and experience life with freedom. In the end, it became a movie not only about youth and travel and diversity but about finding that freedom. -- Cédric Klapisch ABOUT L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE It begins where it ends . . . - Xavier A fresh comedy from the new Europe, L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE is the story of a young man who, through cosmopolitan adventures and comic tribulations, finds his own unexpected place in a mixed-up, multi-cultural modern world. Bursting with energy, optimism and cinematic invention, the film was a runaway box-office hit in France and an award winner at festivals across the globe, ultimately garnering France's Oscar® equivalent, the César, in the category of Best Female Newcomer for Cécile De France and receiving five César nominations including Best Film, Best Director, Best Writing, Best Editing and Best Supporting Actress for Judith Godrèche. Rising director Cédric Klapisch uses a kinetic high-definition digital camera that plays with time, rhythm and space to reflect a year of wild parties, tumultuous love affairs, inspired friendships, sudden heartaches and unexpected connections that add up to a new view of the future. The film is accompanied by a global-music soundtrack that includes tracks from Radiohead, Daft Punk and Ali Farka Toure, along with flamenco, Afro-pop and even Chopin. Set against the dynamism of one of Europe's hippest cities, Barcelona, L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE follows the fate of 25-year-old economics student Xavier (Romain Duris) who journeys there as part of the popular inter-European exchange program "Erasmus," named after the traveling Dutch scholar of the Renaissance. Xavier arrives in Spain completely raw - unable to speak Catalan, unhappy about leaving his girlfriend behind, and uncertain of who he is or what bonds he can possibly find in this city of strangers. Searching for a place to stay, Xavier first falls in with a newlywed French couple, a doctor and his lonely wife, Anne Sophie, who offer up their couch. Then he finds the ultimate situation: an apartment of seven students whose nationalities are as varied as their personalities and sexualities. Their polyglot of languages, Xavier says, reminds him of the chaos that runs inside his own head. The apartment becomes known as L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, literally "the Spanish Inn," which in French slang means a place where cultures are mixed like a stew, where all rules are off and anything can happen. Indeed, the cramped flat soon becomes the scene of riotous situations and comic errors as the culturally diverse students experiment with various ideas on life, love and figuring out the future. Xavier becomes entangled in a web of women: his French girlfriend back home, Martine (played by AMELIE star Audrey Tautou), who seems far away even when she comes to visit; his best friend in the apartment and sexual educator, the Belgian Isabelle (César award-winner Cécile De France), who wishes Xavier was a girl; and the repressed Anne Sophie (Judith Godrèche), for whom Xavier's tenderness soon bubbles over into an illicit affair. But even as hearts are broken and eyes are opened in completely unforeseen ways, even as bedlam and confusion reign in the Spanish apartment, a kind of unity emerges out of the inhabitants' common dreams. The party ends and Xavier returns to France, ready to begin his adult life, a life entirely different than the one he envisioned before he experienced L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. ABOUT THE STORY I don't know why the world became such a mess, so complicated... - Xavier Cédric Klapisch completed the initial script for L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE in a lightning-quick 12 days, writing in both his native French as well as English while bringing in translators to help him accurately use conversational Danish, German, Italian and Catalan for each of the students. At the time, he was about to start directing a much larger-budgeted action film, but when production was delayed, he decided to take the gift of time as a personal challenge to make a film in a more free-wheeling fashion. "I was motivated because I saw it as now or never, to write this script and make this movie in just four months. At first it seemed impossible to do it so fast but it soon became an adventure," he notes. Klapisch placed at the center of his story an average young Frenchman, Xavier, a kind of unfinished soul who begins to define his most important beliefs and desires for the very first time during his trip to Spain. "Part of becoming an adult for Xavier is no longer seeing the world as a simple place, a fairy tale place," says Klapisch. "The world really is a crazy mess - but Xavier realizes that he can enjoy it like that!" L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE reveals not only what Xavier sees and says but also what he feels, wonders about and even hallucinates, giving the audience a chance to viscerally experience his internal evolution over this year of comedic mishaps and personal discoveries. If it seems a subject close to Klapisch's own reality and heart, that's because it is. He too was once a foreign student - a young Frenchman studying film in New York City, where he learned first-hand what it meant to truly enter a foreign country, to have to change your language, your customs, your very point of view. Still, L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE and the melting-pot apartment where Xavier lands were inspired later when Klapisch had a real-life encounter with a similar group of students living with his exchange-student sister in Barcelona. "I discovered in her apartment this new generation of European students who have been deeply changed by the experience of living abroad," he says. "It used to be rare for students of different European countries to get to know one another. But with Erasmus, there seemed to be a different kind of generation emerging: a generation more open to the world, curious about other cultures and more knowledgeable about themselves... I was intrigued by this ...But I also thought this kind of apartment was a great setting to make a very funny film, because with this mix of different languages and lifestyles all thrown together, misunderstandings and miscommunications are likely to happen." He continues: "Very often being an Erasmus student in Europe is similar to what American students go through when they go off to study in a different state. But one difference is that Europe is more like the un-United States! Between the French and the Spaniards there are far more differences historically and culturally than between a Texan and a New Yorker. So becoming an Erasmus student means not only leaving behind your family and friends, but becoming an alien in a strange land, entering a different world with different customs and different habits, different ways of eating and talking and relating. It's something that can really change your attitudes." Of course, traveling to a new country can also bring one face-to-face with the darker realities of deeply-rooted stereotypes and prejudices, which do creep into Xavier's apartment, especially through Wendy's visiting British brother who manages to offend just about all of her friends with his wildly off-base biased comments. This too, came out of Klapisch's experiences. "Wendy's brother is the narrow-minded innocent, the guy who's rude without realizing it, who doesn't at first see the impact of what he is saying. We've all met a guy like that or been that guy," he says. "But I think it's by traveling and opening up new horizons that we can fight that sort of stereotypical thinking." In the end, the film became a mixture of the lived and the fictional, the real and the surreal, or as Klapisch says, "a story which lies somewhere between memory, imagination and desire." CASTING A MELTING POT You get out of it what you put in. . . - Xavier To find his multinational cast, Cédric Klapsich made his own whirlwind journey across Europe - to Copenhagen, Rome, Berlin, London and Barcelona in a mere few days time -meeting with both veteran actors and non-actors in each country. In searching for the seven students, he put less emphasis on previous film credits than on the charisma, good humor and individuality of those he encountered. "It was a true marathon of auditioning," he says. "But talking with all these young actors also gave me a chance to further analyze the question of who are the youth of today and what do they seek, adding to the script and the story, even while I was still finding the cast. Very often I would write a scene based on a conversation I had seen take place between two actors." One of Klapisch's discoveries was Cécile De France, the up-and-coming actress who portrays Isabelle, Xavier's Belgian friend who teaches him, among other things, how to seduce a woman even though she can't be seduced by Xavier. Recalls Klapisch: "The role was modeled on a girlfriend I had in New York who was gay. She liked me but she didn't like men and that became a problem because, of course, I am a man. She really opened my mind about being different, about having different desires." De France went on to garner the César for Best Newcomer in appreciation of her breakout role. "I asked Cécile to embody the masculine quality in their relationship and Romain to take on the feminine role. They really took those ideas and made them their own," Klapisch adds. "They found the nuances." Klapisch always intended to cast popular French actor Romain Duris as Xavier. Duris had previously starred in four of Klapisch's films, including WHEN THE CAT'S AWAY (aka CHACUN CHERCHE SON CHAT), but for this role the actor would have to transform his usual cutting-edge style to take on the creation of a naïve, straight-edged young man who has never even been away from home. "Romain had certainly never played this kind of character before," notes Klapisch. "He is more used to playing very extreme or cool people - and Romain is certainly more outgoing than Xavier. But here he had to play someone who is almost ultranormal and a little shy, a good challenge for him, and he had to come up with a new way of even walking and talking. He also had to learn to speak Spanish and Catalan from scratch, which he did in two months time through intensive classes." He adds: "Our friendship makes it a pleasure to work together. I think the better a director knows an actor, the more they are able to collaborate in creating a character." Klapisch also cast Audrey Tautou as Xavier's impatient girlfriend Martine, just before Tautou was to become a major international star through the magical and incontrovertibly charming title role of the award-winning AMELIE directed by fellow cinematic innovator JeanPaul Jeunet. "I really wanted to work with Audrey because she has such a strong personality. She is truly a tank hiding in a porcelain teapot," he says. The entire cast lived together for a month in the same Barcelona hotel, adding more fuel to their intimate performances. Notes Klapisch: "Often when I went to their hotel at night, I found the reality even more funny and chaotic than the fiction." In bringing together such a disparate cast from so many different backgrounds and cultures, Klapisch hoped to use his lens as a prism through which to view the joy and inspiration of diversity and difference. The more Xavier gets to know his roommates, the more he begins to understand how life is made up of multiple realities, a revelation that leads to his own fateful decision to become a writer so he can embody many different points of view. Xavier also witnesses something life-changing as everyone in the apartment unites -ostensibly to help out the Londoner Wendy whose back-home boyfriend shows up just as she's having an affair with a young American - but also in spirit. "The idea was to show how even when things look completely disparate and desperate, there is always a basic human unity," says the writer/director. In the end Klapisch says the actors influenced the specifics of the resulting comedy and drama as much as his initial script. "I believe that drama always arises from the unforeseen. One can never envision what an actor will do with a scene and out of that comes freshness." As in all of his films, Cédric Klapisch also makes an appearance in the film himself, here as a bartender in a lively Barcelona pub. ABOUT THE CINEMATOGRAPHY I'm not one but many. . .I'm a mess With L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Cédric Klapisch presents a spirited snapshot of modern European youth at a time of great change, when the future seems at once terribly uncertain and wonderfully wide open. This atmosphere of excitement and chaos is reflected in the film's inventive digital style, which features naturalistic performances contrasted against playful special effects, a kind of streaming reality broken up by momentary splashes of dreams, fantasies and memories. "I constructed L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE as a patchwork of odds and ends," says Klapisch. "This became an important principle in the film, because I think it speaks to the nature of things today. These students are searching for cohesion amid confusion, both the confusion of the world and the confusion of being in your 20s and still trying to figure out what you want, what you need, what you care about, and the difference between what you thought the world was like and what it's really like." Klapisch chose to use the latest Sony HD24p high-definition digital camera to match the sense of contemporary commotion and youthful experimentation at the heart of L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. For him, the HD digicam's renowned versatility became a way to play with images and forge a visceral style with emotional as well as physical immediacy. "I didn't want to make the same kind of digital film as I've seen before," he says. "I think this is a format that allows formidable and incredible freedom, it lets you do things you would never be able to do in 35mm, and I wanted to take advantage of that. The HD camera allows you to capture reality in a new way because it creates less of a barrier between the lens and the actor. One thus feels closer to `real life.' In a way it gives directors today what fast film and the new lighter cameras gave to the New Wave French directors in the 60s. It pushed me to play with the camera from a video perspective, rather than a film perspective, using multi-screen, dissolves, different speeds, etc. It was my intention to mix up that sense of documentary footage with the pure fiction of special effects." Klapisch says the film's style aims to reflect what he calls the "more and more discontinuous" essence of modern life, punctuated by constant stops and starts, ruptures and breaks, frenzies followed by periods of calm. It also reflects the frisson of emotions that course through a person emerging into adulthood; at times, Klapisch both slows and speeds up the film, sometimes to an almost Chaplinesque effect, in response to Xavier's everchanging moods. But Klapisch says he also wanted for his film "a style that is no-style, that takes elements of the romantic comedy, the sitcom, the social drama, but is none of these. That reflects the subject of the film, which is diversity." Throughout L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Klapisch gives abstract emotions and interior feelings innovative cinematic expression, as when he demonstrates Xavier's intense sensation of being overwhelmed by how many forms he has to fill out to join Erasmus, by overlaying form after form after form over the screen. In other scenes, the camera even journeys into Xavier's brain, merging memories, dreams and visions while Xavier receives a CAT scan searching for the source of his mysterious sensation that he is being followed by the real Erasmus. The digital camera also allowed Klapisch the flexibility to use natural lighting - such as the scene in which the lights go out in the apartment, a scene which was entirely lit by a single match! Most of all, going digital allowed Klapisch to maintain the spirit of an experiment with a film that is about the European experiment of union and the youthful experimentation with love and life that leads to adulthood. Summarizes Klapisch: "In the end the whole film, the way it was written, cast and shot, was an experiment. It was very different than any other film I've ever made and in the beginning, nobody knew what was going to happen, what the result would be. Like Xavier's journey, it turned out to be a complicated but very happy experience." THE LOCATION A truly wild city... - Xavier Rarely seen on film, Barcelona has long been considered one of Europe's hippest and most exciting cities, now made up of nearly 3 million people, and often found on the cutting edge of art, architecture, fashion and style. Site of the 1992 Summer Olympics, it remains one of the most popular destinations in Europe for both young travelers and students - and one of the continent's most culturally diverse cities. As Xavier soon discovers in L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, the language of Barcelona is not Spanish but Catalan, a delicate and detailed dialect that most Spanish speakers can only understand marginally and is spoken in only one major city in the world: Barcelona. Catalan culture is also entirely unique, with an emphasis on constantly expressing one's individual identity, a way of life summed up by the word duende, which translates to exuberance or the spontaneous expression of emotion. The city also looks like no other, with dynamic architecture, both new and old, on display everywhere. The city center is lined with wide boulevards, ornate fountains and picturesque shops-- and filled with crowds made for people-watching. The mix of Barcelona's architecture ranges from medieval gothic castles to buildings designed by the renowned architect Gaudi, whose fantastical, curving, color-filled structures are as monumental as they are eccentric and fun. Among Gaudi's famous landmarks featured in L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE are the Sagrada Familia, a cathedral of eight flowing, symbol-laden towers begun in 1883, and still uncompleted when Gaudi died in 1926; and the Park Guell, a famously romantic spot made up of galleries, towers, mosaics and pavilions, and considered one of Gaudi's greatest masterpieces. Says Cédric Klapisch of the city: "Many cities could have worked for this movie, but I chose Barcelona because so very few films are shot there, and I knew the city and had fallen in love with its diversity. For many reasons, it is typical of Europe - because it is both very old with its historical sites and very modern with its incredible nightlife, and both very cosmopolitan but with its own strong Catalan identity. These paradoxes are what make Europe so complex and rich." THE FACTS What and Who is Erasmus . . . ? - Xavier In L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Xavier signs up for the Erasmus exchange program, but during his year in Spain, he also finds himself encountering a haunting vision of the Dutch scholar Erasmus himself, a man who envisioned a future of different countries living in peace together. The original Desideratus Erasmus was a 16th century writer, humanist and globe-trotter who became one of the leading thinkers of the Renaissance, a time during which concepts of science, philosophy and culture were radically changed. Ignoring traditional boundaries, Erasmus studied and taught all over Europe and it was said that everywhere he journeyed he brought new ideas with him. His best-known written work is "The Praise of Folly" (1551), a controversial pamphlet that criticized the behavior of political and church elites. satirized human vanity and called for more love and compassion. He was also noted for promoting the use of Latin as the shared international language of the day. Named after the great cosmopolitan educator, the modern-day Erasmus exchange program was started in 1987 by the European Commission to promote unity and mobility between universities across the continent. The program launched with just 3000 students in 11 countries, but by now, more than 1 million students have participated in Erasmus, and the program is considered a major success story for the new European Union. In the year after L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE was released in Europe, the program nearly doubled in popularity. ABOUT THE CAST ROMAIN DURIS (Xavier) Romain Duris has been twice nominated for Most Promising Actor Césars for his roles in GADJO DILO and Cédric Klapisch's much celebrated PEUT -TRE. L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE marks Duris' fourth collaboration with Klapisch, following LE PERIL JEUNE and the multiple award-winning CHACUN CHERCHE SON CHAT. Duris' feature film credits also include: SCHIMKENT HOTEL, PAS SI GRAVE, ADOLPHE, DIX-SEPT FOIS CECILE CASSARD, FILLES PERDUES, CHEVEUX GRAS, OSMOSE, BEING LIGHT, LE PETIT POUCET, CQ, LES KIDNAPPEURS, DÉJÀ MORT, DOBERMANN and MEMOIRES D'UN JEUNE. Duris' television credits include "Facteur VIII," "Freres: La Roulette Rouge," "Freres" and "Le Peril Jeune." In 2003, in addition to L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Romain Duris will be seen in Fox Searchlight Pictures' LE DIVORCE opposite Kate Hudson and Naomi Watts.. JUDITH GODRECHE (Anne Sophie) Judith Godrèche received her second César nomination for her supporting role in L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. Her first nomination was for Most Promising Actress for LES DÉSENCHANTÉE. Godrèche's film credits include: FRANCE BOUTIQUE, PARLEZ-MOI D'AMOUR, QUICKSAND, SOUTH KENSINGTON, ENTROPY, BIMBOLAND, THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK, LE ROUGE ET LE NOIR, RIDICULE, L'INSOLENT BEAUMARCHAIS, L'AUBE À L'ENVERS, GRANDE PETITE, UNE NOUVELLE VIE, TANGO, FERDYDURKE, PARIS S'ÉVEILLE, SONS, LA FILLS DE 15 ANS, UN ÉTÉ D' ORAGES, LA MERIDIENNE, LES MÉNDIANTS, LES SAISONS DU PLAISIR and L'ÉTÉ PROCHAIN. Godrèche's television credits include: "Pour une vie ou deux" and "Emma Zunz." AUDREY TAUTOU (Martine) Audrey Tautou won the French Lumiére Award for her starring role in AMELIE and received multiple nominations including BAFTA, César and the European Film Awards. In 1999, she won a César for Most Promising Actress for her role in VÉNUS BÉAUTE. Tautou's filmography includes: LES MARINS PERDUS, DIRTY PRETTY THINGS, A LA FOLIE...PAS DU TOUT aka HE LOVES ME NOT, DIEU EST GRAND, JE SUIS TOUTS PETITE, LE BATTEMENT D'AILES DU PAPILLON, LE LIBERTIN, VOYOUS VOYELLES, SPOUSE-MOI, TRISTE A MOURIR and LA VIEILLE BARRIERS. Her television credits include: "Le Boiteux: Baby blues," "Chaos technique," "Bébés boum," "La Vérité est un villain défaut" and "Coeur de cible." She will next be seen opposite Justin Theroux and Jennifer Tilly in Amos Kollek's NOWHERE TO GO BUT UP. CÉCILE DE FRANCE (Isabelle) Belgian actress Cécile De France won César and Lumiere Awards for Most Promising Actress for her portrayal of Isabelle in L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE. In 2003 she will also be seen in HAUTE TENSION and MOI CESAR, 10 ANS, _, 1.39 m. De France's filmography includes: LES MYTHES URBAINS, A+POLLUX, IRENE, LOUP!, TOUTES LES NUITS, L'ART (DÉLICAT) DE LA SÉDUCTION, BON APPETIT !, LE MARIAGE EN PAPIER, PETITES JOIES LOINTAINES. KELLY REILLY (Wendy) Kelly Reilly's filmography includes: STARCHED, LAST ORDERS, PEACHES and MAYBE BABY. She is currently in production on DEAD BODIES. Reilly's television credits include "The Safe House," "Sex `n'Death," "Wonderful You," "Children of the New Forest," "The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling," "Rebea," "Poldark," "Simisola," "Prime Suspect 4: Inner Circles" and "The Biz." CRISTINA BRONDO (Soledad) Cristina Brondo is a native of Barcelona with extensive feature film and television credits. Her filmography includes :DIARIO DE UNA BECARIA, LOLA, VENDS CA, LA BIBLIA NEGRA, NO TE FALLARÉ, TODO ME PASA A M_, HA LLEGADO EL MOMENTO DE CONTARTE MI SECRETO, AUNQUE TÚ NO LO SEPAS, CRIMEN PLUSUAMPERFETO, SAID, ENTRE LAS PIERNAS, EL ACCIDENTS, EL FAR, QUINCE, LA CAMISA DE LA SERPIENTE. Brondo's television credits include: "16 Dobles," "Night Club," "Abogados," "El Secreto de la porcelana," "Laia, el regal di'aniversari" and "Poble nou." FEDERICO DIANNA (Alessandro) L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE marks Italian actor Federico D'Anna's second feature film. His first was the 1999 Italian film TERRA BRUCIATA, directed by Fabio Segatori. BARNABY METSCHURAT (Tobias) German actor Barnaby Metschurat received a Best Young Actor Bavarian Film Award for his role in ANATOMIE 2 and SOLINO. His feature credits also include JULIETA and OTOMO. Metschurat's television credits include : "Das Mädcheninternat - Deme Schreie wird memand hören," "Wolfsheim" and "Chill Out." CHRISTIAN PAGH (Lars) L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE is the feature film debut for Christian Pagh. KEVIN BISHOP (William) L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE marks British actor Kevin Bishop's fourth feature film. Previous appearances were in FOOD OF LOVE, THE BIG FINISH and MUPPET TREASURE ISLAND. Bishop spent a year in the role of Sam Spalding in the popular British television series "Grange Hill. " He has had subsequent roles on "My Family" and "Dick Whittington." XAVIER DE GUILLEBON (Jean Michel) Xavier de Guillebon's feature film credits include: BON VOYAGE, QUELQU'UN DE BIEN, VIVRE ME TUE, REINES D'UN JOUR, LA CHAMBRE DES OFFICIERS, OUI, MAIS..., LA DETTE, LE GOT DES AUTRES. His television credits include "La Comète," "L' Eternal Man" and "Les Nuits révolutionnaires." ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS CÉDRIC KLAPISCH (Writer/Director) Cédric Klapisch both wrote and directed L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, a runaway box-office hit in France and an award winner at festivals across the globe, ultimately garnering France's Oscar® equivalent, the César, in the category of Best Female Newcomer for Cécile De France and receiving five César nominations including Best Film, Best Director, Best Writing, Best Editing and Best Supporting Actress for Judith Godrèche. Klapisch has won one Cesar - Best Writing for UN AIR DE FAMILLE - and received a total of eight César nominations including Best Director and Best Film for UN AIR DE FAMILLE, Best First Work for RIENS DU TOUT and Best Short Film for CE QUI ME MEUT. He won a Lumiére Award for Best Screenplay for last year's EMBRASSEZ QUI VOUS VOUDREZ. Klapisch's additional filmography as a writer and director includes : NI POUR, NI CONTRE, PEUT-ÊTRE, LE RAMONEUR DES LILAS, CHACUN CHERCHE SON CHAT and LE PERIL JEUNE. Klapisch helmed but did not pen the following: LUMIÈRE ET COMPAGNIE, 3000 SCENARIOS CONTRE UN VIRUS, POISSON ROUGE. As he did in L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Klapisch often casts himself into a bit part in his films. His actor filmography includes: NI POUR, NI CONTRE, UN JOUR DANS LA VIE DU CINEMA FRANÇAIS, PEUT-ÊTRE, LILA LILI, UN AIR DE FAMILLE, LE PERIL JEUNE, RIENS DU TOUT. BRUNO LEVY (Producer) In addition to L'AUBERGE ESPAGNOLE, Bruno Levy has produced PRINCESSES, FILLES PERDUES, CHEVEUX GRAS and the 2003 release BIENVENUE AU GÎTE. Levy has served as a casting director for nearly 20 feature films including Cedric Klapisch's award-winning CHACUN CHERCHE SON CHAT as well as VENUS BEAUTÉ, REINES D'UN JOUR, CHAOS, LA VÉRITÉ SI JE MENS ! 2, TONTAINE ET TONTON, TOTAL WESTERN, JET SET, THE KING IS ALIVE, TOREROS, REIN A FAIRE, UNE LIAISON PORNOGRAPHIQUE, QUASIMODO D'EL PARIS, CA N'EMPÊCHE PAS LES SENTIMENTS, ARTEMISIA, ASSASSIN and L'ÉCHAPPÉE BELLE. DOMINIQUE COLIN (Direc