Class Act

The life of Bernard Tapie definitely deserved to be told on screen. Absolutely fascinating and absorbing. This man experienced so many things in his lifetime. Good and bad. Straight out of a Tom Wolf novel. Highly recommanded and full of surprises. Laffite does a great job playing the lead role as does Josèphine Jappy playing his wife. It's better if you watch in french with subtitles so you can fully immerse yourself in the atmosphere. Whether or not you are familiar with the real life Bernard Tapie, you will be fascinated by the charisma and audacity of this man. One of my favorite netflix show in 2023.

I had some reservations about "Tapie" before i started to binge-watch. But I must say, that it has surprised me so far (3 episodes to go). A nice built up of the story, cinematography is okay, and the acting is good. Based on my own youth as a teenager in the 80s, I had heard of Bernard Tapie. So, I knew about his liasons to sport. Not so much about his involvement in politics - that's why I enjoyed those episodes the most. But, what I was really disappointed about, is that the series only show his succes with Olympique Marseille. But totally left out that other big universal sport he got involved in: as a sponsor / financer of the La Vie Claire cycling team. The iconic Mondriaan colors of red, yellow, blue, black and white squares and world famous cyclists as French own Bernard Hinault and Greg Lemond as the "poster-boys". 1985,1986 Bernard Tapie's La Vie Claire won the Tour de France - the biggest cycling competition in the World. These were iconic years in Sport. And not a single reference of it: why? A big miss!

I like very much the main actor performance ..he was so natural, so charismatic, so Bernard Tapie and his act make the series so real ..in the other hand .. I like the way the biography was presented ..it was like reading a book .. I didn't know Bernard Tapie before watching the series it make me more curious now about him .. I like also the choice from where they begin the story telling and also the End .. I like the fact that they did'nt make him look like hero or a legend but a human being with his mistakes, ambitions, glories and his "sortir de l'ordinaire" character ..he was a legend just by being himself ..

The scene with Bernard Tapie visiting the State Prosecutor in his office is one of the best scenes I've ever seen.

I was glued to the screen.

Great dialogues, thumbs up to the screen writers. Both using their own strategy & words to intimidate the other. Throwing in some psycholgy of war as well. You could feel the tension in that room. The prosecotur despizing Tapie for what he stands for, not for the human being he is. Very clever. Tapie throwing everything he knows at the prosecutor who keeps his calm.

Truely fascinating to watch. And the mise en scene is amazing, with eye for details, well filmed!

On a much lower scale, the ascension of Bernard Tapie and his aplomb reminded me of Trump... He was a media darling, a businessman that ended up laying off thousands of workers even though he promised he wouldn't... The only differences lie in the fact that Bernard Tapie was a real self made man who could not count on his father's money and that he got burned for flying too close to the sun! He also got married twice only! :-) Anyways, I really enjoyed this series and even though it was largely fictional, many scandals rang a bell to me as I grew up in France in the 80s-90s. It was really entertaining and I definitely recommend this series to anyone that would like to learn more about a man that is still revered as the Boss in Marseilles and who is still worshipped by many in France as the son of a factory worker who became a billionaire, a minister of the government, a tv host, a singer, an actor, a business owner who owned Adidas and changed its logo and the owner of one of the biggest French football club!