Karima Charni’s favorite place at the Château des Vives-Eaux in Dammarie-les-Lys (Seine-et-Marne)? She points at him. It’s this little corner, on the highest step of the exterior staircase, against the right pillar when you have the large entrance door at your back.
When she was a candidate for season 4 of “Star Academy”, nineteen years ago, she liked to sit here, letting her thoughts wander while observing the park and its green expanse. She captured this view for her memory, saying to herself “Look at what you are experiencing” so that she could, later, summon the image and let the memories come back. “This porch is the place that sums up my whole Star Ac. What things have happened here! We talked, we consoled each other, we sat there while waiting for the teachers to arrive…” she lists.
Karima Charni made her return to these places last year, with the resumption of the show on TF1, but this time as co-host. After each bonus, she made – and will do again this year – the bus trip with the students from the plateaus of the Saint-Denis plain (Seine-Saint-Denis), collected their impressions, played the role of a caring “big sister”. and, once the vehicle arrived at the castle gates, turned back, not without greeting the star academicians and asking them to put their microphones back on.
For this new season, launched this Saturday at 9:10 p.m., its functions are expanding: it will be the Voice off daily newspapers and will launch calls for votes, from the director’s office, after each nomination on Wednesday. “I am a program guide, I am not in contact with the teaching staff,” she explains.
“There are minute thieves”
On this Thursday morning at the end of October Karima Charni plays the guide for around ten journalists who have come to discover the new settings. She demonstrates her gift of omniscience. She talks about what she experienced here in 2004 – we no longer remembered that the promotion of the edition won by Grégory Lemarchal did not sleep in the castle but in dormitories set up in an outbuilding – and proves, evocation of anecdotes, that she perfectly followed everything that happened last year.
Back on the porch, she orders us to look into the distance: “Do you see this pontoon? » We can actually see a small wooden platform overlooking a watercourse. “Well, regularly, a woman came to do her yoga sessions there. The students were gesturing at her and trying to get her attention but she never noticed them. Maybe she was a fan of the show and she never knew anything about it,” she smiles.
We enter the castle. The large staircase faces us, the famous red telephone is at its foot. As usual, each student will have one minute per day to call a loved one. “There are minute thieves,” warns the regular who explains the procedure to follow. We pick up the receiver, we then have someone from production on the line who we tell who we want to contact and they put us in touch. There is hold music. In my time, it was Let me dance, which was the anthem of our season. When the song changed, it was a sign that another one of our singles (SingingThen Farewell, Professor) was in operation. »
We enter the first room on the right, the kitchen. “It’s a real place of life where star academicians pass more than three times a day,” comments Karima Charni. There, they will have everything to prepare their meals. » We notice jars of pasta on which each label indicates the cooking time. 4 minutes for shells, 9 for gluten-free spaghetti. “We must not forget that most of the students are very young and have never cooked,” underlines our guide. On one of the walls, a gigantic schedule awaits residents to remind them that they are not here on vacation. “They will have their first lessons at 7 a.m. and, at midnight, it’s lights out,” she explains.
61 cameras, rather discreet
Head to the living room with its petrol blue walls. “It’s THE room, where the students discover the most things. This is where they learn who the nominees of the week are, where they follow the weekly debriefs, where the main announcements are made,” recalls Karima Charni. We notice neon lights evoking the works of Keith Harring, a type of lighting that we will find in other rooms. Same thing for the sort of four-color rainbow, a pattern that runs along the wall of several rooms. The room opens onto a terrace to which students will have access, but smokers will have to go a little further below to satisfy their nicotine needs away from the cameras. Speaking of cameras: the device has 61, rather discreet. “There is no one-way window. Unlike my season, where all the openings to the outside were obscured, they will be able to take advantage of the natural light and see what is happening outside. »
Upstairs are the bedrooms. The girls’ one oscillates between pale pink and cream. The boys’ one is eyeing the rust color. In 2004, a season when the students slept elsewhere, the first was dedicated to styling and the second to photo shoots, the host tells us. In a corridor we spot a mirror adorned with “Paris Latino” neon – one of the many nods to the show’s history scattered throughout the decor.
Messages left in the toilet
We also take a look in the toilets which, of course, remain hidden from the cameras. On the walls, all the star academicians left little words that have never been erased. The class of 2022 has fulfilled the tradition. “Never give up. Keep going! », Wrote the winner, Anisha. “Thank you for everything, I am leaving with a heart filled with hope and dreams,” Enola gushed when Louis greeted with “Thank you for this adventure that has grown and changed me.”
Karima Charni takes us to the other rooms, outside the castle, which will also serve as the daily setting for the show. The theater has a larger stage than last year. “When you come here, you know you’re going to work and not take a nap. Technically, there is everything here to repeat assessments and bonuses. It’s also easier to train here than in the dance hall where you hear what’s going on in the castle,” suggests the regular.
A new feature, the “public room”
The dance hall, in fact, looks like a Norwegian barn with its sliding door and its crimson facade. We note that the production has invested in a large table. The only real novelty in the decor this year is “the public room”, installed in the same building as the office of director Mickaël Goldman (which sees the allocated space reduced by half).
In this place with walls hesitating between pink and salmon, streaked with luminous vertical bands, a student will be able to come and answer questions from viewers or try to convince them to vote for him or her. “We had questions from the public that appeared in the living room certain evenings, but we had to answer them in front of everyone. I would have liked to have access to a room like this to give my answer without any other student hearing,” jokes Karima Charni.
“This place, apart from the red telephone, will be their only way of communicating with the outside world,” she continues. You can’t stop an artist from having a connection with his audience.” But there is no question of letting them access their social networks. The facilitator explains: “The students are in a bubble, it is not useful for them to know what their number of followers is. And then, their schedule is very busy, it’s better that they concentrate on work. » Before taking his leave, our guide leaves us, enthusiastically telling us that he can’t wait for the show to start again. “This season promises to be dynamic and entertaining,” predicts the one who will be there to tell us everything.