Bruno Dumont’s “L’Empire,” which just premiered at Berlin, originally included Adèle Haenel in its cast. The heated back-and-forth between director and actress has been heavily covered in France.
Haenel, who decided to stop making movies due to the “misogyny” in the French film industry originally stated that her sudden departure from Dumont’s film had to do with the script’s "dark, sexist and racist world” which “was full of jokes about cancel culture and sexual violence", deploring the intentionality of the humor targeted by the filmmaker.
Dumont has finally commented on Haenel’s scathing remarks (via Télérama).
After Covid, she was suddenly was very angry at me, before then we were getting along quite well. She all of a sudden wanted to change the script that she had originally found “completely crazy” and “joyful”, and started accusing me of being racist, because I was only shooting with white actors. She has the right to believe whatever she wants, but it took her more than a year to have this reversal of opinion
Upon hearing about Dumont’s recent comments, Haenel fought back with her own side of the story (via Allociné):
I had confronted him about the sexism of the film and the white casting from our very first meeting, and I committed to stay in the film with the knowledge that changes would be made. After a year, I received the new script, and not a line had been changed."
She went on to add: "Is producing a film without even thinking about the presence or absence of non-white actors in the cast not in itself an act of racism? Knowing that cinema has this immense role of building our eyes and desires, isn't it racist to give mostly and systematically the most beautiful roles to white people?"
Dumont hasn’t commented back on these latest remakes from Haenel.
As previously mentioned, Haenel quit acting, preferring to concentrate more on enhancing her political activities. “I don’t make films anymore,” She says. When asked why, she added, “Because of political reasons. Because the film industry is absolutely reactionary, racist, and patriarchal.
When Roman Polanski won the Cesar for Best Director in 2020, Hanael walked out of the ceremony yelling “SHAME!” It was a heavily reported controversy in France. Haenel expressed to The New York Times how repulsed she was by her peers’ recognition of Polanski “Distinguishing Polanski is spitting in the face of all victims. It means raping women isn’t that bad,” said the actress.