22/06/2005

As the betting suggested, the director general of the Véronique Cayla was today named director general of the National Film Centre (CNC) and president, ad interim, of the National College for Image and Sound Trades (Fémis). Ratified by the Council of ministers, the nomination proposed by the Minister of Culture and Communication, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres filled the post of head of the French cinema institution, vacant since the departure of previous boss Catherine Colonna, who accepted the job of Minister Delegate for European Affairs on the 2nd of June.

Joining the Minister of Culture in 1973 with a diploma from the Political Studies Institute of Paris, Véronique Cayla was at first in charge of Cultural Intervention Funds, then in the offices of Michel Guy (Secretary of State for Culture) and of Jean-Philippe Lecat (Minister of Culture from 1978 to 1981) where she was Cinema Advisor. Appointed in 1982 to the Vidéothèque in Paris, she became director general in 1989 before joining MK2 in 1992. Director general for six years, she was nominated on the 20th January 1999 as a member of the Advisory Council for the Audiovisual (CSA) before taking the road to the Cannes Festival. At 54 years old, Véronique Cayla acceded smoothly to the most strategic and most visible job in French cinema. A responsibility that will be helped by her deep knowledge of the sector, as she faces cinema professionals with knives drawn over certain subjects, in particular the opening of French funds to producers outside Europe and the question of independent distribution.

(Translated from French)