Death of Laurent Tirard, director of Le Petit Nicolas, at the age of 57

He admired the gesture of Jacques Tati and loved the genius of the Star Wars Saga. The director Laurent Tirard, an inspired adapter of the Little Nicholas and author of a noted film on Molière, died on September 5 in Paris, after a long battle with illness. He was only 57 years old. These are the words of the press release sent by BCG, his press office, at the request of his wife.

Passionate about cinema since his childhood, Laurent Tirard, who was born on February 19, 1967 in Roubaix, followed his vocation after high school by taking a film course at New York University. He honed his skills by becoming a film critic for Studio Magazine.

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His first film, a short film, From a reliable sourcewas released in 1999. In 2007, he directed the film Molière which will receive the Audience Award at the Moscow International Festival. His first major success dates back to 2009, when he tackled an excellent adaptation of the Little Nicholas by Goscinny and Sempé. In 2012, he signed Asterix and Obelix: In the Service of Her Majesty.

The work of Goscinny and Sempé inspired him again in 2014. He wrote the screenplay and directed Little Nicolas’s Holidays, sequel to the 2009 success. Starring Valérie Lemercier and Kad Merad, this film will bring a smile to the faces of some 2.5 million spectators in cinemas.

He is passionate about humor and the shift. In 2016, with the help of the Dujardin-Efira duo, he signed A Man Who Lives Up to It. He will meet Jean Dujardin again in 2018, in The Return of the Hero a modern swashbuckling film. Proof of the multiple talents of a filmmaker as precise as he is open to all genres.

Diagnosed with cancer in 2012, he underwent a bone marrow transplant which resulted in a graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) which “attacked his skin, lungs, liver, intestines,” he confided in 2020.