Paul Kircher, 22 years old. Irene Jacob’s son is the new star of French cinema

At the age of 22, he has already won the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best Young Actor, the Silver Case at the San Sebastian Festival, and the Lumières de la Presse International Selection. Since then, all eyes have been on the young prodigy of French cinema , which is exposed more and more during the invasion of the screen After them their childrenby Ludovic and Zoran Bucherma, in cinemas from December 4.

“It was never a project.”

Born on December 30, 2001 to actor parents. mother Irene Jacob won the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival. The double life of Veronique (1991), and his father, Jerome Kircher, was nominated four times for Molières; little Paul Kircher regularly follows them on tour. But do not develop the same ambitions as the latter. “Acting has always been important to me, but it’s never been a project,” she confided Madame Figaro November 23: When I was little, I enjoyed being on stage, doing little concerts, that’s all.”

“My parents obviously showed me a lot of movies, but I don’t have a lot of memories of them, except maybe Charlie Chaplin or Louis de Funes, who I adored as a kid.” : “We don’t really know what we want, we have dreams in our heads, like my character who wants to go to Texas…” he explained. Madame FigaroAbout his character in the Bukerma Brothers movie.

And the young man continued After them their childrenI immediately saw an opportunity to work once again on the physical evolution of the body and character. It was great to explore what it’s like to be 14 years old in this wonderful story, both tragic and funny. “I like to make myself funny to make people laugh,” he recently admitted Figaro . Hence the warning words of one of his classmates. Paul Kircher will not wait that long.

In his free time, he first took lessons at the modern music school in Paris. “I sang in various rock bands that didn’t always have a name, except for one, French Breakfast,” he says. world . The coming of age period marks his cinematic awakening. At the age of 18, he discovered films such as “The night belongs to us By James Grey, with Joaquin Phoenix, or At the end of the race, by Sidney Lumet, with River Phoenix” and sets out to “build a mental library of cinema”.

Captain Marlowe

After high school, Paul Kircher joined a course in economics and geography, during which he also went to Trieste, an opportunity, he says, to “rediscover” himself. In 2019, he was enrolled in a theater course at the Manufacture des Abbesses to be filmed Did you catch a fish? Then appears in an episode of the series Captain Marlowe.

A year later, she met a casting director High school studentChristophe Honore’s feature film. After three months of auditions, Paul Kircher was chosen from over 300 candidates, and the director is full of praise for his new recruit. “At that age it is quite difficult. often, when you meet young actors, they are more comfortable with depth, but much less with energy, joy,” he analyzes.

Before adding: “Paul is a great actor. I don’t know if the cinema will match what the cinema can offer. He is an actor with an exciting sensitivity.” In High school studentPaul Kircher plays a young man who has just lost his father and finds solace in his brother (Vincent Lacoste) and mother (Juliette Binoche). An intense experience, after which the actor went to work on a farm in Iceland for two months and practiced boxing.

The Paul Kircher Method

That same year, Paul Kircher landed what would become one of the roles of his life. Emil, a teenager who feels bad about himself, who turns into a wild beast Animal kingdomBy Thomas Cayley. The latter, along with his father (Romain Duris), goes to look for his mother, himself transformed. In 2023 and 2024, Paul Kircher was nominated for a César Award for Best Actor for his performances in two feature films. For the second year in a row, her brother Samuel, 19, appears alongside her in this category for his performance in his first film. Last summer.

The two brothers leave, of course, empty-handed. But they mark the history of the ceremony. As for Paul Kircher, he later won the Marcello Mastroianni Award at the Venice Film Festival. After them their children. The actor, whose filming partner, Ludivine Sanier, appreciates the attention to detail. He thus describes a young man who is “attached to details,” working “very delicately and conscientiously.” A method that has paid off, as we shall soon find in the drama meteorites And The Coming of the Futurea dramatic comedy by Cedric Klapish.