By his own admission, Stéphane Bern concedes having had a “difficult” childhood. He grew up with a castrating mother who abused him every day: “No one can slap me as hard as I was slapped by my mother!” he confided in an interview for Le Point. glasses, chubby and badly dressed” he admits.
These difficult ordeals have nevertheless forged a fighter character. In an interview granted to the magazine TV Grandes Chaînes, he goes into more detail about his past: “For a long time, I had a gesture of recoil when a hairdresser approached his hand from my hair… I was so slapped! didn’t live it well, even if, today, I think it was a good thing, because I was a terribly insolent child. I couldn’t help making faces, I constantly provoked my parents. I was odious. If I hadn’t been put down as a child, I would surely have turned out badly”. Today, Stéphane Bern has overcome the scars of his youth and seems at peace with his past.
More recently, in the columns of Le Parisien, this April 12, 2023, Stéphane Bern has agreed to return to his complex childhood. “My mother was tough. She gave me and my brother a Prussian education, the one she had received. At home, we had more duties than rights,” he said and added. : “The demonstrations of love were conditioned on a job well done. When we were done, we had hugs. I took slaps every day and I have fond memories of it. I took full face… My mother was very sick, diabetic, she was hard on herself and hard on others.
From childhood, Stéphane Bern nourished a fascination for royalty. This atypical passion comes to him from Luxembourg, his mother’s native country, where he spends all his holidays with his loving and caring grandparents: “I love Luxembourg so much that I don’t want to leave it, nor say goodbye to my grandparents. -parents” he recounts in the pages of Paris Match. Introverted and uncomfortable in his skin, he finds comfort and a spiritual family with these crowned heads who amaze him.
This enthusiasm for the elite is fueled by a thirst for learning. He devours all the history books that come to hand. His absolute hero will be the Grand Duke Jean of Luxembourg to whom he writes a letter each year on the occasion of his birthday. Stéphane Bern then has only one idea in mind: rubbing shoulders with this very closed circle and he gives himself the means to do so.
After studying business, Stéphane Bern branched off into journalism, which allowed him to achieve his childhood dream: he obtained an interview with the Grand Duke of Luxembourg. A reward after having experienced years of hardship in his early days in journalism: “It was laborious, I knew the ANPE and the pasta at all meals” he admits bluntly for TV Grandes Chaînes. “The sarcasm strengthened my determination. I fought to prove that I could live from this passion. Today, I want my revenge,” he proclaims.
A great professional success for the man who has become the public figure of French heritage for many French people. The journalist is now on all fronts, whether on television, at the helm of programs such as Secrets d’histoire or even The favorite house of the French, The favorite village of the French on France 2. But also on the radio on RTL in the show A la bonneheure. Ultimate consecration, Stéphane Bern was honored with the title of Knight of the Order of the British Empire in 2014 by Queen Elizabeth II for “his contribution to Franco-British friendship”.
If Stéphane Bern is a natural conversationalist and gladly engages in the game of personal interviews, he has always been discreet about his emotional life. In his private circle, he is very selective about his friendships: “I have no friends in the business, apart from Nikos Aliagas. Most look at their navel too much for me” he concedes to TV Grandes Chains.
Side love life, there was not the shadow of a lover. One could see beside him only his very dear dachshunds: Comma (now dead), Dash and Mirza. In 2015, Stéphane Bern had ended up pouring out a little more about his love situation for Paris Match. He then lived for more than 10 years with his companion Lionel and indulged in a few confidences: “I ended up accepting that love is a slow, patient and complicated construction […] We cannot to be in the same state of amorous exaltation with the same person after several years of living together. Confidence and esteem then succeed to passion”.
In August 2017, the journalist did not hesitate to go further and broke the taboo around homosexuality by posing proudly alongside the man of his life for the front page of Paris Match. An attitude that earned him applause from internet users and many public figures such as Marc-Olivier Fogiel and Christophe Beaugrand.
Nothing seems to stop Stéphane Bern’s rise! The journalist adds a new string to his bow by becoming the Mr. Heritage of the Macron government in September 2017. An important task since he is in charge of promoting French heritage. A composition role for those who have had a deep love for French culture and terroir since a very young age.
However, this new position does not only make people happy. He had to suffer a lot of criticism from historians, but also from public opinion. Stéphane Bern does not hesitate to point out that this assignment is a voluntary mission since he does not receive any remuneration, nor even financial means. He specifies in an interview for Le Parisien his role to play: “I do not take the place of anyone. I am a volunteer and I get beaten up. They have accused my “narrow vision of History […] I come to take care of the small heritage, not to give lessons to historians. Honestly, I believe I have done more for heritage than those who criticize me and I hope to have fewer blinders than them. But in the end, all this controversy motivates me and carries me.
Recently, one of his resolutions hit the headlines. The journalist proposes to charge the entrance to the cathedrals, which has unleashed the grievances of the most fervent believers, and even of the highest religious authorities. Faced with this growing controversy, the Conference of Bishops of France (CEF) reacted on its website: “The cathedrals, even though they are part of the cultural heritage of France, are above all places of prayer and worship to which access must be free”. A new test for Stéphane Bern, but one thing is certain, the journalist does not admit defeat.
