Lauren Collins
The New Yorker
France
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Past articles by Lauren:
French Parents Don’t Know What They’re Doing, Either
An ongoing debate in France complicates the notion that there is an overarching secret to raising kids à la française. → Read More
Owen Wilson, Art Monster
On a museum-hopping day in Paris, the star of “Paint” makes it clear that he knows his Picassos. → Read More
The Other Blockbuster Royals Memoir
Lauren Collins on “Spare” and Wallis Simpson’s “The Heart Has Its Reasons,” in which she details her relationship with the Duke of Windsor and his abdication. → Read More
The Right Not to Be Fun at Work
In a win for workplace dignity, a French high court recently decreed that businesses cannot force their employees to participate in supposedly enjoyable activities. → Read More
How Kevins Got a Bad Rap in France
Lauren Collins writes about the name Kevin and how, in France, it has become stereotyped and symbolic of Americanization and tackiness—causing those called Kevin to be mocked, shunned, bullied, and even discriminated against. → Read More
The Complicated Life of the Abortion Pill
Lauren Collins writes about the history of the abortion pill; its inventor, Étienne-Émile Baulieu; and the history of reproductive justice in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. → Read More
Life After “Call My Agent!”
Fanny Herrero, a rare French showrunneuse, talks “Standing Up,” her Netflix follow-up show about striving standup comedians in Paris. “Emily in Paris” it’s not. → Read More
Valérie Lemercier’s Céline Dion Kinda-Bio-Pic
The writer, director, and star of “Aline,” about a familiar-seeming Quebecois power balladeer, discusses criticism from some of Dion’s relatives (“We come off as a bunch of bums”) and playing Aline at every point in her life, starting as a five-year-old. → Read More
Translating the French Election for the Freedom-Fry Audience
Gilles Paris references “Emily in Paris” and considers Maureen Dowd an inspiration for his daily dispatches in Le Monde’s first-ever English-language column, aimed at American readers. → Read More
The Hidden Mothers of Family Photos
Lauren Collins writes about the recent conversation emerging in the French press about the representation of mothers in family photographs, and how the “hidden mother” has been a phenomenon through history, with mothers from the Victorian era, acting as props for their children, to now. → Read More
A Son Sends Josephine Baker to the Panthéon
Brian Bouillon-Baker—one of the twelve children of the St. Louis-born entertainer, French Resistance fighter, and destroyer of stereotypes—visits France’s hall of “great men” for the induction of his Maman, the first woman of color to be so honored. → Read More
Searching for the Descendants of Racial Terrorism
In 1898, white supremacists in Wilmington, North Carolina, staged a coup and murdered dozens of Black residents. More than a century later, a team of volunteers tries to track down every living relative of the victims. → Read More
Camille Cottin Always Feels Like a Beginner
The French actress, known for “Call My Agent!,” “Killing Eve,” and “Connasse,” co-habits with “fucking Matt Damon” in the Trump-inflected Cannes hit “Stillwater.” → Read More
The Unlikely Rise of the French Tacos
How an upstart fast food became essential dining in the home of haute cuisine. → Read More
How a Personal-Photo Curator Separates the Is-This-a-Rash Selfies from the Keepers
A family of four generates five thousand photos a year. Isabelle Dervaux, a professional photo organizer, makes it manageable: “I’m looking for what Roland Barthes called a ‘punctum.’ ” → Read More
A Parisian Writes Her Revenge
Vanessa Springora was fourteen when the distinguished writer Gabriel Matzneff took her as his mistress. Decades later, she has published “Consent,” a memoir about his “triple predation—sexual, literary, and psychic.” → Read More
The Haitian Revolution and the Hole in French High-School History
The revolution, led by the formerly enslaved Toussaint Louverture, effectively forced France to abolish slavery. Yet many French high-school students learn nothing about this chapter of their history. → Read More
Stop Doomscrolling and Play a Board Game About Class Warfare
The creators of Kapital!, a hit French board game about social class, attribute its success to “being perfectly in tune with the political moment,” Lauren Collins writes. → Read More
The Anguish and Solidarity of Paris Under Lockdown
In places like Paris, which have privileged the I.R.L. over the URL, might this withdrawal from public life amount to a forced taste of something dangerous? → Read More
Jessica Simpson’s Mesmerizing Memoir of Recovery and X-ennial Fame
Lauren Collins on the pop star turned fashion mogul Jessica Simpson and her new memoir, “Open Book,” a mesmerizing account of her life, relationships, and struggles with substance abuse. → Read More