Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier

The married couple Maritie (December 12, 1922 – November 23, 2002) and Gilbert (March 20, 1920 – September 18, 2000) Carpentier were producers of very popular TV shows in France and in many French-speaking countries, from the 1950s to the 1990s.

Biography

Family and studies

Carpentier, born in 1920, is the grandson of the French inventor Jules Carpentier (manufacturer, with the Lumière brothers, of the first cinematographe device) and the French acoustician Gustave Lyon. His father Jean Carpentier was the mayor of the 6th arrondissement of Paris, from 1940 to 1945. Alumni from the Conservatoire de Paris, he is a pianist, organist and composer.

Radio

Just after World War II, Gilbert Carpentier starts working at the French radio Radio-Luxembourg (which will later become RTL) as an orderly, before becoming a radio technician. From 1946, he composes musical illustrations, then, with the help of his wife who writes the texts, they start to produce radio soaps. From the 1950s, Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier realize popular radio shows in France. On Radio-Luxembourg, they host six shows : "L’heure musicale", "Le Club des Vedettes", (presented by Maurice Biraud), "Musique à la Clay" (presented by Philippe Clay), "Les contes de l’aigle", "L’heure exquise" (presented by Anne-Marie Carrière) and "Le miroir aux Etoiles" presented every Sunday by a different artist.

Music

In 1957, they create a Babar disc series for the children. Maritie Carpentier adapts the texts from Jean de Brunhoff while Gilbert Carpentier composes the musics. Those discs were awarded the Grand prix du disque in 1957 from the Académie Charles Cros, the French equivalent of the US Recording Academy.

TV

Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier are more famous for being pioneers of variety TV shows in France. From 1960, after a proposal from the French TV channel ORTF, they start working for the TV.

From 1960, Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier head for TV by first creating numerous shows with their friends Roger Pierre and Jean-Marc Thibault, broadcast live on the ORTF. Later on, others artists join, including Jean Poiret, Michel Serrault, Jacqueline Maillan or Jean-Claude Brialy.

Until the 1980s, they realize lots of others variety TV shows in France, being instrumental in making some French artists popular, such as Serge Gainsbourg, Jane Birkin, Charles Aznavour, Sacha Distel, Claude François, Chantal Goya, Johnny Hallyday, Sylvie Vartan, Mireille Mathieu, Thierry Le Luron, Eddy Mitchell, Dalida, Alain Souchon or Joe Dassin, among others.

Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier's TV shows are recognizables by unexpected duets of artists, actors singing or singers playing, the creation of different sceneries each week, or even the scripting of their shows. Also, Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier's TV shows were often live broadcast and did not promoted artists' current events. For most of them, since their beginnings in radio and until the 1980s, their shows are recorded in the mythic studio 17 of the Buttes-Chaumont Studios in Paris.

Some of their shows, the "Top à..." and "Numéro 1" series in particular, had an audience of 15 million viewers each week, and were being shown in 20 French-speaking countries.

Gilbert Carpentier was in charge of the technical part and the sceneries, while his wife Maritie Carpentier, sometimes nicknamed "la nounou des artistes" ("the artists' nanny"), was dealing with the artistic part.

In 1980, Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier won an Emmy Award for the best foreign TV show.

Detailed list of produced shows

Radio
  • L’heure musicale, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg
  • Le Club des Vedettes, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg and presented by Maurice Biraud
  • Musique à la Clay, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg and presented by Philippe Clay
  • Les contes de l’aigle, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg
  • L’heure exquise, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg and presented by Anne-Marie Carrière
  • Le miroir aux Etoiles, broadcast on Radio-Luxembourg

TV

Tributes
  • Top à Maritie et Gilbert Carpentier, broadcast on TF1 on March 9, 1996 and presented by Christophe Dechavanne
  • Nos meilleurs moments, broadcast on TF1 in August 2000
  • Nuit du patrimoine spéciale Maritie et Gilbert Carpentier, broadcast on Paris Première on September 19, 2009
  • Chabada special Carpentier broadcast on April 5, 2010 on France 3
  • 'Quand la musique est bonne special Carpentier, broadcast on TMC on May 11, 2010
  • Maritie et Gilbert Carpentier is also the name of a tribute song to the married couple from the French singer Bénabar

Bibliography
  • La Maillan racontée par ses amis, Editions N°1, 1993
  • Merci les artistes !, Anne Carrière, 1999
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