Karin Viard: A Mother and Her Partner in Crime – Humour and Heartfelt Moments on the 2025 César Red Carpet

She’s navigated the decades without ever losing that trademark frankness, that no-nonsense way of speaking we all love her for. Karin Viard was back on the red carpet of the César Awards on 28 February 2025 – and she wasn’t walking up the steps of the Olympia alone. By her side, a quiet but noticeable presence: her eldest daughter Marguerite, 26, in a black slit dress with her hair loose, matching her mother like a wink at their renewed closeness.

A mother-daughter relationship that has weathered storms

What strikes you when you look at the two women today is how obvious it is: they genuinely have fun together. Yet not so long ago, Karin Viard described their relationship as “a relational nightmare”. Yes, you read that right. That was in February 2024, on a TV show. The actress, who had just finished shooting Madame de Sévigné, opened up without a filter: “It was years of extreme difficulty, very toxic. And I played my part without realising it, not knowing what to do, even though I meant well.”

What’s crazy is that it was actually when she received the script for Isabelle Brocard’s film ten years ago that she fully recognised the mirror being held up between the 17th-century marquise and her own life. “I thought: this is my story,” she said. Ten years later, the war is over. The peace has the gentleness of a late reconciliation.

“When you celebrate your daughter’s 25th birthday and you’re the only one dancing”

If you’re still in doubt, just take a look at Karin Viard’s Instagram account. In November 2024, she was celebrating her younger daughter Simone’s 25th birthday. And what’s the scene? A mother in a black Courrèges dress, literally alone on the dance floor, busting moves like a teenager. The caption, killer: “When you celebrate your daughter’s 25th and you’re the only one dancing.” Alex Lutz himself responded with a laughing emoji.

That ability to laugh at herself, to share her little moments of loneliness with devastating humour – that might just be the Viard trademark. A mother who was never afraid to talk about sex with her daughters (“Nothing is off-limits”), who raised them to be “free and independent women”, and who today has to “battle just to see them”.

• Marguerite (born 1998): trained in makeup at D-Mai Paris, she worked behind the brush for her mother on the set of Les Apparences.
• Simone (born 2000): a graduate of the École supérieure d’art et de design in Reims, she made her first film appearances in Polisse and Le Bal des actrices.

The “2D cardboard mask”: when Karin Viard doesn’t take herself too seriously

And then there’s that funny image doing the rounds online: the famous “2D cardboard mask of Karin Viard”. No one really knows who started this gag, but the actress, far from being offended, seems to have embraced this goofy distortion of her own face. Because that’s Karin Viard too: an actress who can switch from intimate drama (The Chatouilles, César 2019) to full-blown self-mockery in a snap. That silly mask is a bit of a symbol of a woman who refuses to get a big head, even after three César wins and thirteen nominations.

Today, happily in love with Manuel Herrero (married in June 2022), Karin Viard seems to have found that delicate balance between being a protective mother and a free woman. And if she continues to share such raw confessions about her “long, violent years”, it’s perhaps to remind us of a simple truth: you don’t raise kids without scars, but you can always laugh about them later. Alone on a dance floor, or under the spotlight of the Césars.