Gilles Verdiani

After literary studies in Paris, Gilles Verdiani worked in advertisement in his 20s, while trying to become a director. In 1991 he wrote, produced and directed one short film, "Sic Transit". The film was shown in Clermont-Ferrand, Pantin and Dukerque festivals. Then he created, with art director Cedric Scandella and writer Frank Secka, a critic review, "Crise du Cinema". Five issues of this aggressive and iconoclastic homemade pubication were enough to attract the attention of the French Première new editor-in-chief, Alain Kruger, and in 1994 Verdiani became a film critic and set reporter for the most important movie magazine in France. At the same time he attempted to get interest from producers in his scripts, but failed repeatedly. In 2000 he left Premiere, a poor boy's monthly, for Elle, a wealthy women's weekly. He writes now as a journalist for Elle, as a critic for Teleobs (TV supplement to Le Nouvel Observateur) and as a screen writer for anybody willing. Since July 2000, Verdiani, together with painter and musician Nils Thornander, has focused his creative work in La Zone Erogene, a "multimedia band" that produces "images, sounds & side effects". In February 2002, they launched "Préliminaires", one hour of post-porn video and music on DVD, and in October 2003, invited by writer and art critic Jacques Henric, they showed "Manifeste Obscène" in theater Accatone in Paris. (www.lazonerogene.com)