MEETING WITH DÉBORAH LUKUMUENA

We had the chance to meet Déborah Lukumuena a few weeks ago during a shooting for our new BOTANICA collection. Déborah is an actress full of promises, belonging to this new wave of French cinema, which breaks the codes and dust off an institution still too little representative of the French cultural richness. Despite her young age, she already has an impressive track record.

The youngest and first black woman to win a Cesar for Best Supporting Actress in 2017, Déborah made her name as Maimouna in the film Divines directed by Houda Benyamina, for which she won the Cesar. Déborah also played a social worker at a shelter for homeless women in Les Invisibles by Louis-Julien Petit, and was starring in the adaptation of Ali Zamir’s novel Anguille sous roche adapted for the theater by Guillaume Barbot. She is an eclectic actress who navigates between comedy and drama, cinema and theater. Her ability to adapt comes from her dual Franco-Congolese culture of which she is very proud and influences the actress that she is.

Through her roles, Déborah delivers performances that are touching both in their raw honesty and subtlety. Her characters have a marked duality, and that’s what the actress likes : “it makes them more interesting, probably because I have that duality too.” Her characters are also independent women, who live as they wish, despite the codes of a society with a patriarchal heritage. Women who have therefore chosen freedom, like Deborah Lukumuena.

It’s thanks to her mother, a very strong and courageous woman who raised her five children in Épinay-sous-Sénart in Essonne, that she inherited this determination. The actress even describes it as an anger that guides her, giving her a motivation to go further and to wanting more.

However, she didn’t always have this assurance, as she found it difficult to express herself when she was younger. She was therefore admiring excessive people, with an imposing charisma such as Gargantua (by Rabelais) or Jonathan Rhys-Meyers with his interpretation of King Henry VIII. As she grew up, the actress detached herself from this, according to her : “to live silently, being small is too sad” and we couldn’t agree with her more !

Because Déborah Lukumuena is also a straightforward, honest woman who lives by her own rules, especially in terms of her activism that she conveys through her art, her words and sometimes her silences. Full of confidence, strength and spontaneity, Déborah offers a very refreshing vision of womanhood.

At Rosamen Bado, we are very happy to have been able to showcase her femininity and beauty for this shoot. Déborah poses like a queen with character in a very pop flower power atmosphere.

For Déborah Lukumuena, her definition of femininity can be summed up as an image. That of Rihanna’s album cover “Unapologetic”.

“On the cover she is topless, looking straight at the camera and her breasts are awkwardly covered. I could say that my definition of femininity would come down to this simple cover. In the affirmation of oneself, to embrace your uniqueness, and to forgive oneself for being irregular and imperfect. To embrace oneself. To embrace our wild side. Viola Davis, Cate Blanchett or Rosamund Pike embody a femininity that doesn’t apologize and to which I aspire. Elegant but proud. I don’t want to be this French actress who keeps a low profile to create a mystery, I do that enough in my roles !”