Le Négotiateur, the new TF1 mini-series is broadcast from Monday March 25, 2024…
After HPI, Mercato, The daddy or Pandawhich have had various successes, TF1 is making a new attempt at the comedy detective series with The Negotiator, a 6-episode mini-series which was scheduled on the first channel from Monday March 25. The pitch: Antoine Clerc, forty-year-old and former BRI star negotiator, no longer wants to hear about his former job since a negotiation went wrong. Today he is the happy father of three daughters, Manon 17 years old, Clara 13 years old and Lila 6 years old, from three different marriages, a situation with which he is fully satisfied.
When he is summoned to his bank by his advisor, he finds himself in the middle of a hostage situation. Obviously, it will be put to use and will finally return to service for RAID this time. With The Negotiator, François-Xavier Demaisonwho plays Antoine Clerc in the main role, returns to television and very mainstream series, after appearances in the cinema generally praised by critics and/or spectators.
The condition of François-Xavier Demaison to make The Negotiator
The Negotiator clearly falls into the category of police “buddy movies”, fashionable in the 1980s and 1990s (The lethal Weapon, Beverly Hills Cop…) where we see two agents with radically opposite temperaments teaming up for better and for worse. On one side, then, a slightly lost Antoine Clerc, very emphatic, even too sensitive for the job, and on the other his superior Hélène Banier (played by Jeanne Bournaud), a RAID officer who is as rigid as she is inflexible.
In front of the camera but also in co-production for The NegotiatorFrançois-Xavier Demaison explained in West France why he had embarked on such a project for the first channel. A program which, according to him, is not only “a simple detective series”, but “has the particularity of mixing investigations with comedy and family theater”, Antoine’s life as a father being largely highlighted , like “her feminine side, daddy hen”. “He is not in need of recognition, in over-virility. He is a good guy, at the same time intelligent, sensitive, attentive”, praises François-Xavier Demaison who recognizes himself in his character, he who is also the father of two daughters.
“TV is one of the last media that we still watch as a family. I love the idea that 5 million people find themselves in front of their television at the same time,” also assures the actor who believes that “we can very well make an easy-to-consume ‘popcorn movie’, because the episodes are short and always tinged with humor, while ensuring a certain level of quality.” All sprinkled with some societal issues, such as over-indebtedness or the financial difficulties of farmers.
But for The Negotiator, François-Xavier Demaison had another condition that was undoubtedly even more important: “on the other hand, I want to co-produce everything I do on television. This allows me to keep a hand on the artistic side and to do projects that suit me. look similar,” adds the actor in the regional daily. “For the moment, all the fiction that I have produced has always had good success, both critically and publicly. But if one day it doesn’t work, I will only have myself to blame .”