PortraitThe 21-year-old actress is one of the revelations of the “Olympiads”, by Jacques Audiard, in theaters on November 3, named after this Parisian district which brings together the Chinese community from which she comes. She embodies a sassy Parisian, in contrast to the very strict education she received from her parents.
Not easy to fit an interview into Lucie Zhang’s schedule. The young Franco-Chinese actress, who imposes a presence that is both angry and endearing in The Olympics, Jacques Audiard’s new film, in theaters on November 3, is a third year student in economics and management at Paris-Dauphine, one of the most selective university courses in France, and does not plan to skip a course for a second. Question of principle and education : “The two primary values of my family are health and good grades. “
We finally find her at the end of the afternoon at the Prétexte, a café on the 13the district located at the foot of the famous slab of the Olympiads, a tangle of towers and tall buildings erected in the 1970s in what has become the Chinatown of Paris. It is in this impersonal and ultra-graphic setting that the director ofA prophet chose to tell in black and white the meeting of three young people in search of identity and love.
A few dozen meters away, twenty-two years ago, Lucie Zhang’s parents met in a Chinese canteen on avenue de Choisy which now houses a McDonald’s. Her mother was 21, she was studying accounting, her father had arrived ten years earlier. They got to know each other during one of these meals organized by the Chinese community in Paris to facilitate meetings and mutual aid. “In China, my father was from Yunnan province and my mother from Henan province, in the center of the country, 3,000 kilometers apart, explains Lucie, 21 years old. Without the 13e, they would never have crossed paths. “
“When I was younger, my parents told me that I would do whatever I wanted when I was 18, but nothing has changed! Lucie Zhang
A year later, on October 27, 2000, Lucie was born in a clinic in the arrondissement, then the family moved to the suburbs before returning to Paris with one more girl and one boy (16 and 14 years old today). Like many Chinese who settled in France in those years, they opened an Asian restaurant. The Zhang’s is located avenue de Versailles, in the 16e arrondissement, and it is no coincidence: “My parents wanted us to have access to good schools. “
The father concocts specialties from his country, hot broths full of flavors based on rice noodles, “The best in France”, proudly comments his eldest daughter. Her mother provides the service while studying Chinese medicine by correspondence at a school based in the Netherlands. The family lives in 42 square meters above the restaurant, so most of the time, Lucie does her homework in the room, among the customers.
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