The connected stories of the Montand-Signoret and Monroe-Miller couples could be mistaken for a Greek tragedy, in which circumstances seem to guide the characters inexorably to their downfall. This is how we wanted to tell the story: showing how, in the destiny of these two couples, the intimate and the personal blend into broader history.

We wanted to shine a light on that inevitable process by telling the story in detail, through all those events that sometimes go unnoticed or forgotten, which reveal the hold that the Hollywood machine and the Cold War had on their careers and their love lives: a piece of gossip in the newspapers, a visa refused or granted, FBI manoeuvres, a strike that delays a shoot.

Day by day, the story follows the months both couples spent together, sharing their everyday lives, getting up-close and personal to the characters and their emotions. We live through the dazzled French couple’s amazement to be in Hollywood, like two kids living their American fantasy, and we witness the admiration they received there. But there is also the other side of the daily grind in the Hollywood machine, which little by little chips away at their dreams.

There being no shortage of footage, photographs and interviews, the archive material is plentiful, making it possible to tell a very engaging story of these four characters: we see Montand in rehearsals, the couples dining in their Beverly Hills Hotel bungalow, Signoret candidly recounting the events that shook her relationship with Montand.

Through the chronicle of amorous infidelity there also emerges a story of political infidelity. In their quest to conquer Hollywood and America, these artists who dreamt of a better world left behind their dreams, along with those of an entire generation.

Sylvain Bergère