On April 5, 2023, singer Florent Pagny unveiled his autobiography called Pagny by Florent in which he confided candidly about his private life. The interpreter of Knowing how to love had evoked his fight against lung cancer. A disease that he had revealed via a video published on his social networks in January 2022. In the process, the husband of Azucena Caamaño had returned in more detail to his love affair with singer Vanessa Paradis, from 1988 to 1991.
Vanessa Paradis, aged 16, against 27 for Florent Pagny, would have taken the first step in their relationship. The two artists had met in 1989 on the occasion of a film festival in Avoriaz in Haute-Savoie. “After the collective dinner, I decide to return to my room and take my leave. In the middle of the night, I take a few steps in the snow when I hear: ‘Florent!’, he wrote and continued: “A voice that trembles cold, because she came out after me without taking the time to cover up. I had felt that there was something wrong in the evening and I did not know what”.
In the process, the current companion of Samuel Benchetrit “jumps on him” and kisses him. “She was in love. A sixteen-year-old lover. Passionate and cute (…) Vanessa was happy, she was shouting it from the rooftops. As for me, I took all her nightmares and made dreams of them . Suddenly, she started smiling, she communicated, she opened up and she tore everything up,” he said.
Because of their age difference and her greater maturity, Florent Pagny did not hesitate to protect her from the sometimes cruel world of cinema in which she had oriented her career. While Vanessa Paradis was to shoot in the film Les noces blanches, the singer quickly became disillusioned. “I stay there for a day or two, happy for her to see that the atmosphere is excellent,” he recalled. An atmosphere that would have changed quickly, as he had noticed when he returned to the film set. “Looks like it’s not the same movie, not the same set. Things got out of hand. This story doesn’t belong to me, it belongs to Vanessa. So I can only state my feelings and not all the facts “.
According to him, it would have “inappropriate things happened” on the set “to such an extent that I had him arrested. When I arrived that day, I could not help but go up in the tricks to protect my fiancée”. The artist did not hesitate to step up to the plate against the director Jean-Claude Brisseau. “Listen, you’re just garbage, so you’re going to stop your fucking movie, this is what’s going to happen. I’m going back to Paris with Vanessa. Stop the abuse,” he said and explained: ” Brisseau had no choice but to behave. You won’t find that version of the story anywhere.”
