It’s a shame Gerard Depardieu has renounced his French citizenship, because in so many ways, he’s the perfect symbol for France, a mascot, like a French Uncle Sam. Last June he got drunk and fell off his scooter (probably cracking his baguette and smushing his satchel full of frogs in the process), and according to a recent interview, the 65-year-old says he drinks up to 14 bottles of wine a day. That kind of tolerance puts him up there with other titans of drinking like André the Giant, who was also from France. You guys? Maybe we should move to France.
The 65-year-old said: “When I’m bored, I drink. Apart from compulsory moments of abstinence. After bypass surgery, and also because of cholesterol and stuff, I have to be careful. […]
“But if ever I start drinking I can’t drink like a normal person. I can absorb 12, 13, 14 bottles per day.
Discussing his operation, he explained: “I was asked to tell the doctor about my consumption. So I said, ‘here it goes’.
“It starts at home with champagne or red wine, before 10am. Then again champagne.
“Then pastis, maybe half a bottle. Then food, accompanied by two bottles of wine. In the afternoon, champagne, beer, and more pastis at around 5pm, to finish off the bottle. Later on vodka and/or whisky.
“But I’m never totally drunk, just a little p****d. All you need is a 10-minute nap and voila, a slurp of rose wine and I feel as fresh as a daisy.” [Mirror]
I don’t know what I enjoy better, the fact that his light, Euro-pastry breakfast includes half a bottle of wine, or that his method of sobering up involves a siesta followed by drinking more wine. “Like I always say, my one regret in life is that I never figured out how to drink wine while napping.”
All I could think about when I was reading this was Nick Kroll’s sketch for The Spotted Ox Hostel. “Oont zen for breakfast, ve haff somezing light, like maybe a bottle of red wine oont a bowl of heavy cream…”
I still remember when Gerard Depardieu was just a regular dad, trying to get his out-of-control teen daughter Katherine Heigl to stop prancing around the beach in a one-piece thong.