At 57, Juliette Binoche has just accepted her first role in a series, the Staircase, an HBO series.

In a series for the first time

Juliette Binoche is therefore in the series The Staircase, the new series from HBO Max which retraces the case of Michael Peterson (played here by Colin Firth), a successful novelist accused of the murder of his wife Kathleen (Toni Collette), found died at the bottom of the stairs of their home in North Carolina. In 2003, the widower was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, before being released on bail during a new trial in 2011.

Inspired by reality

This drama inspired by reality will show the life of the accused, embodied by Colin Firth, before and after the suspicious death of Kathleen (Toni Collette) in 2001. A news item as complex as it is fascinating, which questions the workings of the American judicial system. Juliette Binoche plays Sophie Brunet, the editor of the documentary, who happens to have fallen in love with Michael Peterson during filming. Beyond the outline of her character’s arc, the actress signed on with only a vague idea of ​​what to expect. This is the very first time that the Frenchwoman has played in a series, apart from the episode of Ten percent in which she plays her own role.

A forty-year career

If Juliette Binoche has avoided television during her almost forty-year career, it is because the small screen seemed to her to be totally distant from the cinema. Hence his surprise when The Staircase director Antonio Campos asked him to join the cast. “I embarked on the adventure with the desire to try new things as an actress, she says. When I said yes, the episodes weren’t all written yet. It was a dive into the unknown. »