Marguerite (2015) Catherine Frot – Movie Reviews

Marguerite is a seriocomic look at an absurd set of circumstances, loosely inspired by the true story of American singer Florence Foster Jenkins (Jenkins is set to get her own film in 2016, played by Meryl Streep). Set in France around 1920, Catherine Frot plays Marguerite Dumont (her name and occupation, a Marx Brothers nod), a wealthy, aristocratic socialite who has a deep-rooted passion to be an opera singer, despite not having any talent to do so. Due to her wealth status, and many enablers, including long-suffering (but neglectful) husband Georges and their protective butler Madelbos, who haven’t the heart to tell Marguerite that she’s not exactly easy on the ears, she dives in headfirst at a career in the vocal arts. Now that she’s taking just singing among friends and peers in private ceremonies to the public arena, those around her are at a loss as to what to do in order to minimize the damage inflicted on Marguerite’s fragile ego once the general public has paid to hear her embarrassingly caterwaul on a theater stage.