Gad Elmaleh’s New Film Explores Religious Conversion and Family Secrets

In this new comedy that will be released in theaters on November 16, Gad Elmaleh plays the role of a man who has been living in the United States for three years and decides to return to France to convert to Catholicism without telling his family. "Will you really, as we see in the film, take a retreat, recharge in a monastery?" asks Laurent Ruquier, the host of Club Première.

"Yes, I’ve already done a retreat in Sénanque, near Avignon where there is a Cistercian abbey. Moreover, I experienced something very funny there. One morning at breakfast, there are lots of people coming to ask me for selfies and there is a brother passing by who sees me and doesn’t understand and he summons me to his office. He asks me if there is a problem... I answer no my brother. It’s just that people wanted to take a picture with me," details Gad Elmaleh.

And the monk brother to resume: "And they, do they know you? So you take pictures with people who know you but that you don’t know?" In reality, the latter "had no idea who I was. [...] He tells me that he has been there for fifty-two years and that he doesn’t have a TV. And I redid my CV in front of this brother, he asked me why I was known, why people were interested in me and I also wondered why people were interested in me. And it put my feet back on the ground. I redefined myself," confided the Moroccan.