Maggie Cheung, ‘une chinoise’: Acting and agency in the realm of transnational stardom

Abstract

‘Pourquoi une chinoise?’ asks José Murano (Lou Castel), the replacement for director René Vidal (Jean-Pierre Léaud) in the latter half of Irma Vep (1996, France), Olivier Assayas’ meta-filmic remake of Louis Feuillade’s serial Les Vampires (1915, France). In Assayas’ film, Vidal is an ageing director, who is also in the process of remaking the classic French serial, but has taken the decision to cast Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung (playing herself) in the eponymous role. Vidal offers this reason for doing so: ‘No French actress can be Irma Vep after Musidora - it’s impossible, it’s blasphemy.’ He claims to have selected her for the part based on a ‘very cheap cinema’ he had seen her in in Marrakech. Halfway through the production, Vidal experiences a creative and mental breakdown and is replaced by Murano, an out-of-work film-maker on welfare benefits, who takes a more nationalist view. For Murano, the casting of a Chinese actress in a French role seemed unthinkable, asserting that ‘Irma Vep is working class Paris [Paris populaire]. Les Vampires is not Fu Manchu’.