The scrum half of the Blues Antoine Dupont and the former opening half of the XV of France Frédéric Michalak entered the Grévin museum in Paris on Wednesday evening, just over a hundred days before the start of the Rugby World Cup In France. “Frankly, it’s disturbing to find yourself face to face with ‘self'”, said Dupont (26 years old, 47 selections), whose wax statue sports the official outfit of the XV of France of which he is captain.
“Honestly, it’s crazy work,” added the player, admiringly, joking that he had “had to take a red card (on November 12 against South Africa, following which he had received a four-week suspension, reduced to two on appeal) in order to be able to take the first steps” for his double. Michalak (40 years old, 77 selections), whose statue is dressed as a coach since he will join the management of Racing 92 next season, described as “super weird” the fact of being next to his double, that his four children, who came to Grévin, found “very similar”, he confided.
Close to Mbappé
France is hosting the 2023 World Cup from September 8 to October 28, whose opening match at the Stade de France will pit the Blues against the New Zealand All Blacks. The two players, emblematic figures of the France team as of the Toulouse stadium about ten years apart, began to pose for their wax doubles on November 14, according to the museum. The Parisian establishment, which claims more than 850,000 visitors per year, specified in a press release that they had first lent themselves “to the game of photos, videos, 3D image captures, face and body measurements and molding of hands”.
It then took a second appointment “intended to check the plastiline modeling of the face”, which took place, in the case of Antoine Dupont, in Marcoussis, at the National Rugby Center, during the Six Nations Tournament . Dupont and Michalak join other great figures of French rugby at Grévin: winger Adolphe Jauréguy (1898-1977, 31 selections), second line Lucien Mias (92 years old, 29 selections) as well as third line Sébastien Chabal (45 years, 62 selections), reconverted as a television consultant.
Their doubles appear in the sports district of the museum, not far from Kylian Mbappé (football), Zinédine Zidane (football), Camille Lacourt (swimming), Clarisse Agbegnenou (judo), Renaud Lavillénie (pole vault) or Martin Fourcade ( biathlon).