Cannes Persona Non Grata T-shirt in demand.

Lars von Trier in Berlin

Lars von Trier in Berlin

There had been some speculation that Lars von Trier’s director’s cut of Nymphomaniac: Volume 2 would premiere at the Cannes Film Festival this year.

Even though the Danish director provocatively attended the press conference for Nymphomaniac: Volume 1 in Berlin this year, sporting a T-shirt stamped with “Persona Non Grata, Official Selection.

The film did not figure, however, in the Official Selection announcement this week.

Quizzed by a French journalist at the Cannes press conference whether Von Trier was still “persona non grata,” artistic director Thierry Fremaux replied: “That old Cannes chestnut again, do want to add to your question whether there are women directors in the selection next?”

“When he wore his T-shirt with Festival de Cannes - Persona Non Grata, I sent him message saying ‘I want this T-shirt’. To which he replied, ‘I’m pleased you’ve taken it in that way.”

“But he didn’t send you a T-shirt,” added festival president Gilles Jacob dryly.

Von Trier was famously declared ‘persona non grata’ by Cannes’ board of directors during the 2011 festival after calling himself a Nazi and saying that he “sympathised with Hitler a little bit” during the press conference for Melancholia. Fremaux told Screen last year that the ban was for that edition only and not for all time.


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