For Christmas evening, TF1 and France 2 decided to pull out all the stops and go blow for blow. Once inseparable, Jean-Luc Reichmann and Nagui will once again find themselves face to face.
It’s a Christmas evening like no other that’s coming up on TF1 and France 2. This Tuesday, December 24, two of television’s biggest rivals will face off during two unique evenings. A special show The 12 midday shotshosted by Jean-Luc Reichmann on TF1, will face a Don’t forget the lyrics just as special, hosted by Nagui. A duel at the top between two television giants who were once inseparable.
If the two hosts have been competing for years with giant karaoke and general knowledge questions to be the favorite of the French, their shared history goes back much further and has not always been that of fierce rivalry. In the 1990s, the two men worked together for a long time, notably on the shows May the best win And Don’t forget your toothbrushin which Reichmann played the crazy voice-overs for Nagui.
But when Jean-Luc Reichmann wanted to take off solo, relations between the two men became strained. At the time, in the mid-1990s, Nagui did not welcome the idea of his sidekick hosting his own show. In the documentary Jean-Luc Reichmann, an extraordinary destinybroadcast on TF1 in 2022, Nagui explained: “It wasn’t jealousy, but clearly when the channel started to say to me: ‘Do you think Jean-Luc could host such and such a show?’, I “I had a feeling of potentially losing a team member.”
Since then, everyone has successfully charted their own path, positioning themselves as a sure value in their channel. And over the years, friendship seems to have taken over competition. Last June, the two men even had a moving reunion when Jean-Luc Reichmann arrived on the set of Don’t forget the lyrics. “We have known each other for 33 years […]. It’s thanks to Nagui that I became what I am because you left the door open for me and the microphone open,” said the latter to an emotional Nagui. Before concluding: “I wanted to tell France I love you very much.”
“We’ve known each other for thirty years. We don’t go on vacation together, but our children know each other, we write to each other, we talk to each other, there’s no problem,” Reichmann also explained in C to you last July. “The great thing about Nagui is that every time we meet it’s a joy,” he added, assuring that he had the “fantasy” of being able to day do a show again with his sidekick.
While waiting for this much-hoped-for joint project, it is indeed as rivals and each on their channel that Nagui and Jean-Luc Reichmann will face each other on New Year’s Eve. But who knows? What if Nagui finally returned the favor to his friend by visiting him for Christmas?