Giscard’s wife spent an evening in the sheikh’s harem

Giscard’s wife spent an evening in the sheikh’s harem

President Giscard d’Estaing returned very pleased with his successes on his tour of the Arab oil principalities; his wife and the ministers’ wives who accompanied him did not.

It began at the official reception held in Giscard’s honour by Kuwait’s ruler, Sheikh al-Jaber, at which Madame Anne-Aymone Giscard d’Estaing was not allowed to attend. She was ushered through the back door into the sheikh’s harem, and spent a thoroughly feminist evening in the company of his team of wives. Later on the trip, too, Anne-Aymone would “disappear” as soon as she got off the plane, even before her husband went out to inspect the guard of honour.

The fate of the French ministers’ wives was even more humiliating. They were taken down the aircraft’s emergency stairs so that, heaven forbid, they would not be seen by the cameras.

Towards the end of the tour, Madame Giscard d’Estaing began wearing a “fashionable” hat with a long veil hanging from its brim. A tried-and-true remedy against the sun and against further harassment by the laws of Islam. What won’t one do for the homeland.

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Jesus in the football stadium

The director and actor Robert Hossein, who certainly deserves the title “Cecil B. DeMille of French theatre,” has done it again.

Another of his grand-scale productions, “Danton and Robespierre,” with hundreds of participants, played for months in the vast hall of the Palais des Congrès in Paris. The man who presented the French Revolution to Parisians with such great authenticity, and before that “The Hunchback of Notre-Dame” in the sports palace, now wants to turn to the New Testament and stage “A Man Named Jesus.” The producers, although increasingly confident of the success of this kind of spectacular theatre, suggest that for now he settle for “The Three Musketeers.” But Robert Hossein is not interested. He insists on Jesus. This time, apparently, at the Parc des Princes football stadium. Why not?

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The proceeds—to Kibbutz Merhavia

Seven years ago, Nicole [illegible] was a singer and journalist. She became known for songs such as: “I Try for Love,” “Barbara Is Growing Older Too,” “Who Will Support You.” She was a regular contributor to the weekly newspaper “Politique Hebdo” in Paris. [illegible] Kibbutz Merhavia, of which she has been a member for seven years.

The Yom Kippur War made her realize that she would be of more use there than in Paris. At first she worked in the cotton and grapefruit branches. Today she is responsible for “diet food” for 250 members of the kibbutz who have figure problems. Nicole also managed to study Hebrew at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Even so, she used the seven-year period for writing as well: 500 poems and one major novel. She hopes to sell them well in Paris, with all the proceeds going to the kibbutz. They probably never thought of that as a branch of the economy there.

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Chaplin’s “forbidden film” screened in secret

Paris’s most secretive ceremony takes place at regular intervals in the famous Cinémathèque, founded by Henri Langlois, in the Palais de Chaillot. The fortunate invitees receive a phone call inviting them, in the name of a certain lady, to a screening of a certain film. The lady is Lady Oona Chaplin, widow of the famous actor, and the film is “A Woman of Paris” (or “A Parisian Woman”). It is Chaplin’s only film that its creator banned from public screening, and today his heirs continue the eternal curse he laid upon it.

Chaplin made “A Woman of Paris” in 1923. It is the only one of his films, apart from “A Countess from Hong Kong,” in which he himself appears only in a tiny episodic role. It is a melodrama about a young woman who arrives in Paris and loses her innocence. On its release the film won critical praise, but failed disastrously at the box office. Audiences wanted comedies from Chaplin—and with him in them. The failure affected him so deeply that he destroyed every copy of the film except one, which he entrusted to Henri Langlois. For 57 years, screenings have been held for the “Two Hundred and Fifty Club.”

The whole story of Chaplin’s love-hate relationship with his film also involves (of course) a love-hate relationship with the woman who was its star, Edna Purviance. She was Charlie’s partner in his early films, and when he was about to begin his partnership in the new company United Artists, of which he was one of the founders, he asked, as a parting gift, to “make Edna a star.” He saw the film’s failure as his own personal failure toward her, too. Another attempt to include her in von Sternberg’s “The Silent Woman” never saw the light of day, and all its copies were destroyed.

Chaplin wanted Edna perfect or dead, and she died unknown in 1958.

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A shrine to Islam in Madrid

After a fierce contest involving no fewer than 55 countries, architects from the People’s Republic of Poland were the ones to win the Islamic Conference’s competition to establish a centre for Islamic culture in Madrid.

The centre will cover ten thousand square metres allocated for the purpose by the Madrid city council, and its aims are “to serve as a shrine and embassy for Islamic culture and a meeting place for the whole world.” The Poles, a company from the city of Katowice, beat French competitors in the competition. The Warsaw newspaper “Życie Warszawy” is not troubled by socialist architects building a shrine to Islam. Instead, it expresses great pride that the high standard of Polish architects has once again been demonstrated.

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The president looked after his journalists

The oil princes’ treatment of the 138 French press correspondents who accompanied Giscard on his tour was, it must be admitted, extremely generous.

In the principality of Abu Dhabi, every male journalist received a watch valued at about a thousand dollars, while the women journalists received a gold lighter stamped with the ruler’s seal. The Association of Presidential Correspondents prepared a list of recipients by name so that no one would be left out. The president looks after his reporters. Besides, it will surely now be easier for them to forget distant affairs such as Bokassa’s diamond gifts to Giscard and his family.