Karin Viard, Mom and Partner in Crime: Candid Confessions and Humor on the Red Carpet of the 2025 César Awards
She's navigated the decades without ever losing that freewheeling tone, that unfiltered way of speaking we love about her. Karin Viard was back on the red carpet at the César Awards on February 28, 2025, and she didn't walk the steps of the Olympia alone. By her side, a quiet but noticeable presence: her eldest daughter, Marguerite, 26, in a slit black dress with her hair down, matching her mother like a wink at the rekindled bond between them.
A mother-daughter relationship that weathered storms
What strikes you when you look at the two women today is how obvious it is: they have fun together. Yet not so long ago, Karin Viard described their relationship as "a relational nightmare." Yes, you read that right. It was in February 2024, on a TV show. The actress, who had just finished shooting Madame de Sévigné, confessed without a filter: "It was years that were extremely difficult, very toxic. And I contributed without realizing it, not knowing what to do, trying my best with good intentions."
Here's the crazy thing: it was precisely when she got the script for Isabelle Brocard's film ten years ago that she fully recognized the mirror 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 sweetness of a late reconciliation.
"When you're celebrating your daughter's 25th birthday and you're the only one dancing"
If you still have doubts, 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, shaking it like a teenager. The caption, hilarious: "When you're celebrating your daughter's 25th birthday and you're the only one dancing." Alex Lutz himself reacted with a laughing emoji.
This ability to laugh at herself, to share her little moments of loneliness with devastating humor—that's maybe the Viard trademark. A mother who was never afraid to talk about sex with her daughters ("No taboo here"), who raised them to be "free and independent women," and who now has to "work hard just to see them."
- Marguerite (born 1998): trained in makeup at D-Mai Paris school, 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 floating around online: the famous "2D cardboard Karin Viard mask." Nobody's quite sure who started this gag, but the actress, far from being offended, seems to have embraced this goofy spoof of her own face. Because that's also Karin Viard: an actress who can go from intimate drama (The Little Tickles, César Award 2019) to total self-mockery in a snap of her fingers. That ridiculous mask is a bit of a symbol of this woman who refuses to let fame go to her head, even after three César wins and thirteen nominations.
Today, as she's happily in love with Manuel Herrero (married in June 2022), Karin Viard seems to have found that fragile balance between being a protective mom 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 leaving some scars, but you can always laugh about it later. Alone on a dance floor, or under the spotlight of the César Awards.