On the screen Garance Marillierthe actress who plays Marinette Pichon, wears the jersey of Saint-Memmie, near Châlons-en-Champagne: yellow and blue with a bored cross in the center. In the biopic dedicated to the first star of French women’s footballwhich will be released on June 7, the actress Sylvie Testud, as club president, wears the Saint-Memmie Olympique (SMO) scarf on her shoulders. The very one that the supporters in the stands are agitating with enthusiasm.
“The little anecdote is that these are jerseys, scarves and tracksuits from the time when Marinette played here. We gave them to the production which used them for the filming in Picardy. We have the impression of having taken part in the film on our scale,” confides Bruno Dalla-Libera, co-president of the SMO. The biopic which traces the career of the former international football player, will be broadcast in preview this Thursday evening May 25 at the Châlons-en-Champagne cinema, which is also in the presence of Marinette Pichon, specially returned from Quebec, where she is a trainer and television consultant.
“It’s three kilometers from the stadium where she cut her teeth. People from the club will come, there will be people for sure, ”says Régine Pierre, president of the Saint-Memmie club at the time. Club leaders, former colleagues or players, young SMO recruits No one wants to miss this and Bruno Dalla-Libera the first: “She is part of the history of our club. She’s a model, she showed that if we fought, we could succeed. And, today, even if she lives in Quebec, we still have a connection with her.
“It is impressive what she has achieved”
In the 2000s, Bruno was notably one of his coaches at Saint-Memmie. On film, it’s actor Fred Testot who takes on this role. And Sylvie Testud lends her features to Régine Pierre, the former president of the Marnais club. “Compared to the kid I knew, it’s quite impressive what she has achieved, comments the latter. Today it’s downright a film that comes out about his life. I really want to see it but it makes me weird to imagine an actress playing my role. It’s still a part of my life where I dedicated myself to women’s football. And Marinette, football gave her everything, it saved her. »
Raised by a courageous mother who faced a violent husband, the ex-Bleue evolved in a difficult environment. But she quickly stood out thanks to her talent and pugnacity. Selected at the age of 18 in the French team, she then quickly signed for the Philadelphia club in the United States, thus joining the first women’s professional league. A memory that will not fail to comment on Marinette Pichon, expected at the Marne screening this Thursday evening. For the locals of the stage, it’s a more nostalgic sequence which risks bringing back memories: the rise to the First Division in 1999. “It will undoubtedly be a moment of emotion for my part”, slips Bruno Dalla- Libera.
