HER CALLING AS AN ACTRESS

It was seeing Anthony Quinn in the film The Hunchback of Notre Dame that made me want to be an actress. The scene where we see Quasimodo swinging from the top of Notre-Dame cathedral, screaming in pain for not being seen as he had wanted, blew me away with emotion. I had the feeling that the character was talking to me. I come from a completely crazy family; at a very young age, I developed a way of looking at humanity that enabled me to protect myself. Since no one expected anything of me, it gave me more freedom: I think you have to write down your desires, your wishes.

MEETING HER AGENT, LAURENT GRÉGOIRE

At the Dramatic Arts Conservatory in Rouen, I met Franck Dubosc. At the time, he had starred in the film A nous les garçons and already had an agent. I asked him to help me find an agent. Franck arranged for me to meet his agent, saying, "Karin, you have to come well dressed". So I bought myself a satin dress and turned up at the casting session at 2pm in an evening gown! I didn't have the right credentials for the job (laughs)! I could see that the agent was sceptical, but his assistant convinced him to cast me. That assistant was Laurent Grégoire, who became my agent and friend. Laurent and I escaped our milieu by getting into this industry.

HER RELATIONSHIP WITH FILMMAKER SÓLVEIG ANSPACH

Sólveig was very important to me: she was a very dear friend and a director I admired. From the moment we met, we had an intimate, unspoken rapport. When she offered me the lead role in the film Haut les cœurs!, the story of a pregnant woman who has breast cancer, I didn't know if I had it in me to do it. My agent told me, "You can’t turn down this role". It was a very important role, allowing me to connect with something tragic inside of me. 

“HAZING” BY THE LARRIEU BROTHERS

I received the script for the film A Real Man by the Larrieu brothers, and I saw that from the very first scene I was hosting my topless friends for a party. I thought to myself, this is a nightmare, what kind of dirty people are these? I turned down the part and when I saw the film, I thought I'd been a fool. A few years later, I explained to them that I'd turned down the part because of the topless scene. They said to me: "You should have told us! We would have rewritten the scene". Then they offered me a part in Happy End and I saw that I had a scene where I had to sit naked on Mathieu Almaric's face (laughs)! I realised they were teasing me; it was like a hazing. Since then, I've made three films with them and I love them!

EHOW SHE PREPARES FOR A ROLE

First, I learn the text three times until I can say it while doing something else, that's the minimum. What interests me is the intimate process of playing a feeling: you think about the different possibilities of interpreting it. For example, you can play being annoyed in a very different way (she mimes the scene). When I arrive on set, I put myself in such a state of alertness that I use my entire environment to help me nurture the role.