His voice marked several generations of fans. Isabelle Morizet, better known in the 1970s as Karen Cheryl, is celebrating her 68th birthday this Wednesday, July 19, 2023. From her beginnings to today, she is a star with several strings to her bow.
The young woman from Saint-Germain en Laye, in the Paris region, first became Carène Cheryl and made her debut in music. Spotted by the secretary of the producer Claude Carrère, the singer published several albums and gained notoriety in the middle of the decade and in the 1980s by signing several successes. Among Karen Cheryl’s cult hits, we remember in particular Sing to me Mama, Si or Oh! darling darling…
An incredible popularity with the public which greatly marked the famous singer. “The fans climbed on my car, I was protected by bodyguards in the streets,” she confided in Gala, according to comments relayed by Le Journal des femmes. Driven by this success, Karen Cheryl becomes a media personality and turns to another field.
Between the 1980s and 1990s, Karen Cheryl became a television host and hosted programs for young audiences. Like Vitamine on TF1, La Lucarne d’Amilcar on M6 and Hugo Délire on France 3. She also made her debut as an actress by making appearances in The girls next door, The new girls next door, Never two without you …t and My favorite clairvoyant.
But her artistic career will falter and Karen Cheryl is experiencing a desert crossing. This is how she will make the decision to make her alter ego disappear to regain her true identity. “One night. I think. I call my little sister who lives in Los Angeles. I tell her that I’m stopping everything. I put everything I had of me in a big suitcase: articles, records d’or… everything related to Karen Cheryl. This big suitcase, in the early morning, I put it in the street, in front of the house, so that it would be taken away, that it would disappear”, confides she in 2018 for the site of La Nouvelle République.
Starting from scratch, Isabelle Morizet experienced many obstacles before being able to establish herself with the media. “I started to make appointments, to imagine TV and radio shows. I knocked on all the doors and, each time, the answer was the same: you are Karen Cheryl, you don’t have no legitimacy to do anything other than sing“, she mentioned to our colleagues.
By dint of perseverance, the host Isabelle Morizet returned to television in The happy years of France 2, mid-2000. Then, she became a columnist on France 3 from 2010 to 2019 in Les Grands du rire. Now married to Jérôme Bellay, the sexagenarian gives voice to the airwaves of Europe 1. She notably hosted SLC, people interviews, Confessions orbitales (2002-2006) and every weekend, Il n’y a not just a life in a life, since 2012.
Flagship face of the PAF, Isabelle Morizet has long been judged on her physical appearance, rumors claiming that she would have succumbed to the scalpel. “I did the tip of my nose, period! So what? I’ve been told about cosmetic surgery for 37 years, my God!, she defended herself at Jordan De Luxe on her show in October 2022, adding, “But I was in great shape 37 years ago. I really didn’t need it”. Focus in pictures on its evolution until today in pictures.
