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CULTURE

Paris Opera appoints Guillaume Diop first black Etoile dancer

The Paris Opera on Saturday appointed 23-year old dancer Guillaume Diop to its Etoile category, the first time a black person has received the ballet's coveted top rank.

This picture taken on March 7, 2023 shows Guillaume Diop speaking during a press conference for the Paris Opera ballet 'Giselle' in Seoul
This picture taken on March 7, 2023 shows Guillaume Diop speaking during a press conference for the Paris Opera ballet 'Giselle' in Seoul. On Saturday, he was promoted to the ballet's top Etoile rank. Photo: YONHAP / AFP

The promotion, announced on stage at the end of Diop’s performance of Giselle in Seoul, propels him to the ballet’s highest rank without having to go through the “Premiere” category for several years as is usually the case.

The “Danseur Etoile” (“Star Dancer”) rank is given for rare excellence, and only a handful of dancers of made it there directly in the past 50 years.

Diop, who was born in Paris to a Senegalese father and a French mother, was among five black or mixed-race authors who in 2020 published a manifesto “About the Race Question in Opera”.

Since starting at the Paris Opera in 2018, Diop has danced in several Etoile roles, with lead performances in La Bayadere, Don Quixote, Swan Lake, and Romeo and Juliet.

“I didn’t expect this at all,” Diop told the Le Figaro newspaper on Saturday.

“I hope that this reassures the parents of kids like me who want to follow this career path, but I’m not sure I want to talk about this. I basically worked like everybody else.”

Jose Martinez, the Paris Opera Ballet’s dance director, told the paper that Diop’s “artistic qualities, his charisma and his potential” had been the reasons for his choice.

“At no point did it cross my mind to appoint him because of the colour of his skin,” Martinez said, adding: “It’s a very good thing that this has happened.”

READ ALSO: Rebel ballet dancer and TV judge suddenly quits Paris Opera

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CRIME

French cinema boss on trial for sexual assault

The head of France's top cinema institution Dominique Boutonnat denied sexually assaulting his godson as he went on trial Friday in a case that has led to calls for him to step down.

French cinema boss on trial for sexual assault

The trial comes as French cinema reels from a renewed #MeToo reckoning that has seen several big names, including acting legend Gerard Depardieu, accused of sexual abuse.

READ ALSO: French actor Gérard Depardieu to be tried for sexual assault in October

Activists have denounced Boutonnat’s continued leadership of the National Centre of Cinema (CNC), whose role includes overseeing measures to curb sexual violence in the industry.

His godson accuses him of trying to masturbate him during a holiday in Greece in 2020 when he was 19.

“I looked at him to find my godfather and that’s when I saw someone completely different… It was someone using me to masturbate,” the godson, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court.

Boutonnat responded in court that it was his godson who had initiated the situation and kissed him.

“I feel bad about leaving an ambiguous situation, but to say there was a sexual assault is false,” he told the court.

He was placed under investigation in February 2021 but still reappointed by the government as head of the CNC in July 2022.

Training to prevent abuse has in recent months become obligatory for films seeking public funding via the CNC.

The CNC told AFP that the case against Boutonnat came from “the private sphere” and had no relation to its activities.

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