Let's dispel any possibility of confusion. Although there are plenty of great things to say about it, the film Colette, to be released next January, is not about our restaurant. Rather, it deals with the life of the one to whom we pay homage; Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, a woman of letters, but also and especially, a liberated woman.
A woman in chains!
An eagerly anticipated biographical drama film from the British director Wash Westmoreland, Colette stars Keira Knightley in the title role. In Paris at the end of the 19th century, young Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette married Henry Gauthier-Villars, a writer, libertine and literary critic of the artistic and bohemian Paris of the period. He was an undistinguished author but quickly discovered his wife’s literary gifts and asked her to write novels to appear under his pen name of Willy. Inspired by her school days, Colette wrote Claudine at School, which became a huge success upon its release in 1900.
A woman liberated!
The Claudine series of novels were best sellers, but it was ‘Willy’ who reaped the rewards. Basking in his bogus success, he was unfaithful to his wife while forcing her to continue ghost writing for him. Gradually, however, she asserted her independence, cutting her hair, wearing male clothes and having affairs. Gabrielle faded, and Colette was born! We have not yet seen the film but look forward to a biopic that will probably be romanticised but hopefully also faithful to this courageous woman who took charge of her destiny and claimed her rightful credit for her creativity. “My name is Claudine, I live in Montigny; I was born there in 1884, probably I will not die there”. As early as the first sentence of her first novel, Colette, who in 1945 became the second woman to join the Académie Goncourt, already foresaw her exceptional destiny.
Colette in Saint-Tropez
It was in 1925 that Colette discovered Saint-Tropez, fell for its charm and bought a small vine-covered Provençal villa she named ‘la Treille-Muscate’. Here she tended her garden, rested and wrote until 1939. Her memory is commemorated in Saint-Tropez ... and in our Restaurant Colette!
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Restaurant Colette, a unique setting, a singular signature and a modern concept
