By David Ross. I notice that Carla Bruni-Sarkozy is slated to appear in Woody Allen’s next film, Midnight in Paris, due out in 2011. For the first time in about twenty years, I feel a genuine impulse to eavesdrop on the suffocating repetition and solipsism of Allen’s once great, now moldering career.
I keep my eye on Carla Bruni not only because she is one of the most beautiful women in the world and it’s hard not to keep one’s eye on her, but because the hint of wit and personality makes her beauty fascinating. Who can resist the Cleopatran glamour of a comment like this:
“I grew tired of rocks stars. I wanted a man with his finger on the nuclear trigger.”
Musically, she has been tasteful but not timid, turning, for example, an obscure Yeats poem, “Those Dancing Days are Gone,” into a creditable shuffle. Yeats delighted in beautiful women. I’m sure his shade is amused and gratified.
For the full effect, however, Carla must be experienced in French. Her first album, Quelqu’un M’a Dit (2002) is particularly fetching (you can see her perform Raphaël here). She delivers the entire album in a breathy purr, as if whispering in your ear.
Bruni is not a weighty or ambitious artist, but she is a completely feminine artist. In the American musical tradition, by contrast, even the most demure maidens – Norah Jones, for example – have inherited at least a suggestion of the old blues salt, a certain existential bone to pick in the gruff tradition of Robert Johnson. I would not trade this blues sinew for all the kittenish purring in the world, but Bruni makes for a delicious change, as well as makes clear what, in part, it means to be American.
In related news, widely reported rumors have it that Bruni’s marriage to the French president has become, shall we say, modern. Only in France could the first lady and the president simultaneously carry on affairs while the nation watches in a mood of mild titillation and amusement.
[Editor's Note: rumors of the Bruni-Sarkozy simultaneous affairs remain unsubstantiated - although the folkloric appeal of these rumors seems potent to the French.]
Carla Bruni-Sarkozy has done a pretty good job as French First Lady, IMHO, given all the pressure that’s put on her and the endless gossip. She was part of the ’80s squad of “glamazon” supermodels, and I always thought she had the most sophisticated appeal of any of them. I’m glad to see she’s still around. Too often our society discards women over 40, but in Europe at least they seem to still appreciate them. She looks great, and is multi-talented to boot.
I definitely prefer this First Lady to what we’ve got right now.
The Americans are more interested in this story than the French – no doubt because it lives up to American stereotypes of French “immorality.”