Emily Atef Will Next Direct Series About a Decadent Family-Owned French Fashion Empire (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Emily Atef, who is presenting her latest film, “Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything,” in competition at the Berlin Film Festival, just moved to Paris to direct “La Maison,” a series depicting a fictional family-owned French luxury fashion empire.

While discussing “Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything” ahead of its world premiere, Atef told Variety that “La Maison” will be filled with a lot of drama and tragicomedy. “It’s very Shakespearean.

There’s so much beauty and luxury with old mansions in Brittany, Parisian ‘hotel particuliers,’ and then behind all that there’s so much human poverty, and you see them ripping each other appart for power,” said Atef, who will direct the pilot and three more episodes.

The series was created and penned by Jose Caltagirone (“Les Combattantes”) and Valentine Milville (“The Bureau”), and will star a high-profile French ensemble cast, including Lambert Wilson (“Benedetta”), Carole Bouquet (“En Therapie”), Amira Casar (“Call Me By Your Name”), Zita Hanrot, Pierre Deladonchamps (“Stranger by the Lake”) and Antoine Reinhard (“BMP Beats Per Minutes”). “It’s hard to compare anything with ‘Succession,’ but we could say it’s a bit like a French ‘Succession’ set in the fashion world,” revealed Atef, whose made several incursions in TV throughout a career, most recently with “Jackpot” and episodes of “Killing Eve.” She also compared “La Maison” with “The Crown,” because the French fashion clan “lives like they’re in a monarchy,” and are very “lonely” and “derogatory” towards outsiders. “La Maison” is being produced by Alex Berger at the Oligarchs Prods., whose credits include “The Bureau” (currently being remade into “The Department” with George