The former public service presenter and journalist died this weekend at the age of 68. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in the 1990s, he lifted the veil on the illness in a book released last fall.
I am coming back from far. This was the title of his latest work. Just a few months after this release, the former television host, Sylvain Augier , died on Saturday March 16 at the age of 68, at his home in Sommières (Gard). He was known for presenting “Faut pas rêve” and “La Carte aux Trésors” on France 3.
A radio and television man for more than thirty years, Sylvain Augier has mainly worked in the public service. After starting out as a reporter on France Inter, the Toulouse native, a graduate of the Institute of Political Studies, became a face of Antenne 2, first co-presenting “Sexy Folies”, a show devoted to sexuality with Mireille Dumas in particular. . Then in 1990, he became the presenter of the now cult escape magazine “Faut pas rêver”. There will then be “The Treasure Map”, where two teams of candidates compete to find the famous Compass Rose by borrowing helicopters. Still broadcast on France Télévisions, this program left its mark.
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A great fan of thrills, Sylvain Augier was as daredevil as the contestants in his game. Helicopter and racing car pilot, he practiced extreme sports such as free falling or hang gliding… “I tried to go fast, to race with automobile competitors on water, on sea, in the air, on the road, I fulfilled my life well», summarized the person concerned on October 12 on the set of “Buzz TV” on Figaro TV Île-de-France which will be one of his last television appearances.
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Sports that he practiced even at the risk of his life. Sylvain Augier came close to death after a paragliding accident on August 27, 1988. At the time, a host on France Inter, he presented his show from his hospital bed! “That tells you if I had any energy!», remembered the one who also became addicted to morphine after this episode. An addiction which fortunately only lasted a few weeks, thanks to the warning from his wife Carol. During his coverage of the Route du Rhum in 1990, he lived the high life, traveling on business, inviting all his collaborators to restaurants, renting a yacht… “I had this crazy energy then moments of weakness that I didn’t understands,” he explained in his latest work. Symptomatic moments of an illness.
Suffering from bipolarity
Sylvain Augier didn’t know it yet but he had bipolar disorder. The first signs appeared after this famous solo transatlantic race in 1990 in Pointe-à-Pitre, won by Florence Arthaud. Back in France, the television man, then aged 35, was in his hotel room in Brest and felt violent abdominal pain. He thinks he is the victim of a heart attack but the doctors make their diagnosis: he is bipolar.
Sylvain Augier kept the secret for a long time, suffering in silence on set. “I was hiding. I didn’t want to show my colleagues and the public that I was suffering. I remember curling up in the back of a car so no one would recognize me before going to host a television show, and I did that for years», he recalled on our set of Figaro. “When an episode of “The Treasure Map” stopped, I went up to my hotel room to find a safe sleep because I was so tired from the tension of filming», he further described. An illness which gnawed at him so much that he made several suicide attempts, including one in the early 2000s, in front of a TGV which was arriving at 160 km/h. At the last moment, thanks to his wife and their two children Manon and Hadrien of whom he is thinking, he moves away from the railway tracks. Since being treated, he will never have suicidal thoughts again.
“I am afraid of suffering but not of death”
Sylvain Augier on the “Buzz TV” set on October 12, 2023
His bipolarity pushed him to withdraw from the world of television in 2014, after a stint on Sud Radio where he conducted interviews with personalities from the cultural world. He goes to live in Lecques, a small village in Gard. “I wanted to return to the Mediterranean south with the sun and the ease of life“. He reads a lot, notably Philippe Labro, but no longer watches his old show, “La Carte aux Trésors”, today hosted by Cyril Féraud, which he nevertheless finds “young and bright“. “I presented this show for ten years, I don’t want to be nostalgic», he often indicated to those around him.
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In 2018, Cyril Féraud recounted this moment when, during the intermission of a show he hosted, Sylvain Augier dubbed him. “He was adorable and very touching. (…) It was a nice handover”had entrusted the presenter of “Slam” to our colleagues at Tele-Leisure. Sylvain Augier was opposed to the idea of reducing the presence of helicopters in the show, considered dangerous and not very ecological. “That would mean canceling the show.“, he estimated.
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Spiritual and Catholic, Sylvain Augier liked to quote this sentence from Jacques Brel: “God is men and they don’t know it“. This close friend of Sister Emmanuelle, who had interviewed Father Pierre, lived with this idea that “God is in each of us“. “I have a divine vision of existence. I always tell myself that God protects me“.
A philosophy that did not make him fear death. “I’m afraid of suffering but not of death, perhaps because there is something else after», he suggested again to our microphone. “What’s hard is the death of others, of those we love», he added while understanding that we can resort to assisted suicide in Belgium or Switzerland. “What’s hard is the passage. (…) It can be a relief. I have seen cancers last interminably and with an obligatory end. Why prolong the suffering ? », he asked again. “I could use it at a certain age, but not at 68“.