Sony Pictures Classics gets ‘Coco Before’ Anyone Else

Now that both Coco biopics are in post production, we’ll be in a better to see if the many foreign film markets have enough place for the both of them. The turf war in France will see Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky trailing behind the soon to be released Coco Before Chanel (April release in France), but it looks like Jan Kounen‘s version is logically, an odds on favorite to be selected for Cannes. With the Igor film exploring the obscure romance between Coco and the Russian composer (played by popular Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen), today, Sony Pictures Classics has claimed Anne Fontaine’s version (starring Audrey Tautou), with hers being the one that might work better commercially. If the distribution company is smart, they’ll aim to release the film during the Fall fashion season.

Coco Avant Chanel is adapted from the Chanel biography “L’Irreguliere” by Edmonde Charles-Roux. The pic focused on Coco’s childhood and womanhood. The woman who invented French chic was born into poverty as Gabrielle Chanel, the illegitimate daughter of a traveling salesman, in 1883. After the death of her mother and abandonment by her father she spent seven years in a Catholic orphanage, where she learned to sew. But fashion wasn’t her first career choice. As a young woman, Chanel had ambitions to be a singer and it was while warbling “Who’s Seen Coco in the Trocadero” in a cabaret that she acquired the nickname Coco. While working as a cabaret singer, she also took to sewing the stage clothes for the likes of French cabaret star Mistinguette before being taken under the wing wealthy Balsan. His chateau became Chanel’s home and her gateway to a new life. Balsan introduced her to Capel, who played a crucial role in Chanel’s rise to fashion fame and fortune.