“Madame Stavisky”, Antoine Billot’s novel, retraces the fate of Arlette Stavisky, the wife of the shrewd financier but above all the notorious con artist Alexandre Stavisky, whose crimes triggered bloody riots, a surge of antisemitism in France, the resignation of a government, and the creation of a left-wing front.
Let’s start again.
Born in 1903, Arlette Simon is one of the most beautiful women in Paris. She works as a model for Coco Chanel when she meets Alexandre Stavisky. A passionate love soon unites Arlette to Alexandre, even though he already carries the shadow of a delinquent past.
Nicknamed “the handsome Sacha” by Parisian high society, he was born Jewish in Slobodka, in the former Russian Empire, in 1886. He arrived in France at the age of four and lived a bourgeois life in Paris, between his dentist father and stay-at-home mother, while studying at the renowned Condorcet high school. A smooth talker, he has already flirted with illegality by stealing the gold ingots used in his father’s dental prostheses to sell them.
As an adult, he continues his wrongdoings, which are numerous: fraud, forged checks, illegal gambling dens, drug trafficking, and even Treasury bond scams. Arrested in 1926 for theft, he is sentenced to eighteen months in prison at La Santé, but manages to secure release on medical grounds with the help of a convenient doctor’s certificate. His trial is constantly postponed thanks to corruption – and will, in fact, never take place.
His father, unable to repay the debts accumulated by his son, takes his own life in 1926.
He marries Arlette in 1928, and the couple soon lives lavishly while cultivating respectability – settling into a suite at the Claridge hotel on the Champs-Élysées, buying the Empire theater, and frequenting the fashionable social and political circles of the time.
The affairs of the man now called “Monsieur Alexandre” boom spectacularly. Stavisky has set up a Ponzi scheme involving municipal bonds from Orléans and Bayonne cities – made possible through the corruption of public officials and mayor-deputies.
His embezzlements, amounting to hundreds of millions, are uncovered at the end of 1933. He flees, without Arlette, to Chamonix, but the police tracks him down. When they entered the cabin where Stavisky is hiding, shots are fired; they find the con artist dying on the ground, hit by a bullet in the head. He dies the next day in hospital.
Officially, Stavisky committed suicide – but public opinion believes he was made to commit suicide. His death becomes a media sensation and plunges the French Third Republic into turmoil: the right-wing political movements exploit the scandal, fiercely attacking government corruption and fueling an anti-parliamentarianism already stoked by earlier financial scandals – Hanau and Oustric – made possible through the ties between financial crooks and political elites. The far right also inflames latent antisemitism, which now spreads through public opinion.
Anti-parliamentary demonstrations are organized in February 1934 and end in tragedy, with several dead and thousands injured. The crisis leads to the fall of Daladier’s second government and has a profound influence on French political life.
The left-wing movements interpret the February 1934 riots differently. They see them as proof of the radicalization of the right toward fascism and begin a rapprochement between socialist and communist movements, which would take shape a few years later.
Where is Arlette in the midst of this madness overtaking France? She is in prison. Accused of complicity, she is incarcerated for nearly two years before being acquitted and fleeing across the Atlantic to rebuild a shattered life. She will in turn be a model, a dancer, then return to France to work as a seamstress – before leaving once again, this time for Puerto Rico, where she marries a military officer.
Antoine Billot’s historical novel attempts to give shape to these truly extraordinary characters. But what is the measure of historical truth in this fictional biography? It is hard to say, as both Arlette and Alexandre are shrouded in mystery; their lives, deeds, and reputations having been distorted countless times by the press and politicians of the era.
In March 1934, Joseph Kessel set out to trace the portrait of a man who had almost become a friend in his book “Stavisky, The Man I Knew”. It takes real courage to publish such an account. Kessel is clearly impressed by Arlette, whom he sees as a young woman of fine and solid character, of impeccable character. Kessel also leans toward the suicide theory – a suicide through persuasion – supported by the last letter Stavisky left for Arlette.
But legend had already swallowed so much of the story that plain reality could barely be glimpsed.
It is probably this very aura of myth that Alain Resnais seeks to capture in his 1974 film “Stavisky…” where Jean-Paul Belmondo embodies a phantom-like figure who stirs the imagination of all who encounter him – yet, precisely because of this, leaves behind no tangible trace of fact or reality.
Chanel trousers – Monoprix jumper and hat – Castaner espadrilles – Vintage umbrella and de Castelbajac blue umbrella – Sunglasses stolen from my daughter – Prada purse
May 29, 2026
