Having an aperitif at snack time, with a fasting enthusiast who has just returned from a week of detox, shakes up the rules of exercise a little. Even more so when said person has a reputation as a good living person. The meeting takes place at Café Jeannette, in Paris, a charming restaurant a stone’s throw from the Montparnasse Tower. An air of tavern with yellow striped blinds, a green and flowery terrace, but too windy that day to sit there.
Just enough time to appreciate the nicely retro decor, and here comes former television presenter Maïtena Biraben, right on time. No-fuss look. Short blond hair, disheveled, pink sweater under a big black down jacket, jeans and ankle boots. Post-diet period obliges, it will be a sugar-free coffee for the now producer. “I prefer to stay a little longer in my ketosis phase” – the stage where, deprived of carbohydrates, its usual fuel, the body will draw on fats – explains the one who, for fifteen years, has been forced to do a major spring cleaning of the body and mind once a year. . “It resets the counters, it’s beneficial for the skin, bones, energy”assures us the person concerned looks good.
She came as a neighbor to this brewery, her “HQ” culinary. The address has two advantages: a tasty menu and proximity to Mesdames productions, the company she founded in 2019 with her friend Alexandra Crucq. These two have known each other for twenty-six years – since Maïtena arrived in Paris to work with Thierry Ardisson, whose assistant Alexandra was then. It was there, on the sixth floor of the tower, with a panoramic view of all of Paris, that she began her new life, far from the cameras.
The small team produces documentaries and fiction, broadcast on the Web or on platforms, such as OCS. Since May 2, the two partners have embarked on a new adventure, that of a digital media dedicated to women over 45. Accessible free of charge, Ladies.media offers short video content every day, interviews, crash tests, testimonials or humorous pastilles, where we find the face and paw of the former star host of the PAF.
Bringing “obligation to misfortune” into play
“The idea is to tell the true story of this period of life, which is only told through the prism of loss. A 50-year-old man is the sum of all his experiences, a 50-year-old woman is the end of everything she has been. Well no ! », she asserts, playing with her chainmail cuff bracelet.. “At 56, you’re not a mother, and I don’t want people to talk about me and women of that age as if that were the case. »
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