The incredible journey of a world pastry champion

UPDATE DAY

PARIS | Its story is worthy of a fairy tale. After spending his childhood in homes and foster families, Yazid Ichemrahen, a young Frenchman of Moroccan origin, became a star of gastronomy by winning, at only 22 years, the world pastry champion competition .

Adapted from the autobiographical book by Yazid Ichemrahen, published in 2016, the film À la belle étoile retraces the extraordinary journey of this gifted young chef nicknamed in France the pastry chef of the stars. 

The feature film directed by Sébastien Tulard chronicles Ichemrahen's rise in the world of cooking, but also looks back on the difficult childhood of the boy, who was tossed from home to foster family after being rejected by his mother.

Producer Laurence Lascary fell in love with Yazid Ichemrahen's story, devouring her book shortly after its release. However, she was not the only one to imagine a film while reading the book: three other producers had already contacted the pastry chef when she in turn approached him to try to acquire the rights to his autobiography. 

“What we did differently from the others is that we offered him to be part of the adventure”, explains Laurence Lascary, met last January in Paris as part of the Rendez-vous from Unifrance.

“The idea of ​​getting involved in the project appealed to Yazid. He therefore worked on the script and he was very present on the set during filming. »

« A natural »

After seeing more than a hundred actors in auditions, Sébastien Tulard decided to entrust the role of Yazid Ichemrahen to Just Riadh (Riadh Belaïche, by his full name), a young 24 year-old influencer who has more than 10  millions of subscribers on social networks, but who had never played in the cinema before.

“ Riadh offered something that was totally different from the others, sums up Sébastien Tulard. He is very intelligent and he understands very quickly. It took little time to define the character and find the tone of his game. It was natural for him. » 

Under the stars, on view since Friday.