French producer Nicolas Altmayer, co-founder of prolific production outfit Mandarin & Compagnie and his wife, longtime Dior executive Mathilde Favier, died in a car accident in France on August 17, aged 61 and 56 respectively.
Their deaths have sent shockwaves through France’s film and fashion industries.
Altmayer co-founded Mandarin & Compagnie, formerly Mandarin Production, with his brother Eric Altmayer in 1996. The company has since produced more than 70 feature films.
Among Altmayer’s best-known credits are James Huth’s hit comedy Brice De Nice, Michel Hazanavicius’ OSS 117 films, Roschdy Zem’s Chocolat and Rémi Bezançon’s The First Day of the Rest of Your Life.
He also produced several films directed by François Ozon includingYoung & Beautiful and By The Grace Of God, as well as Bertrand Bonello’s Saint Laurent.
Mandarin & Compagnie continued its collaboration with Bonello on the upcoming dramatic thriller, the Vatican-set Santo Subito!, starring Mark Ruffalo and Charlotte Rampling. More recent credits include French box-office success Molière, Cyrano and the Young King, Safy Nebbou’s Nobody’s Son, starring Romain Duris and Grand Corps Malade and Mehdi Idir’s biopic Monsieur Aznavour.
In 2017, Nicolas and Eric Altmayer jointly received France’s Académie des César’s Daniel Toscan du Plantier award, which recognises the producer of the year.
Favier, 56, was PR director at LVMH and a longtime Dior Couture executive. She was regarded as one of the fashion industry’s best-connected and most widely admired figures.
The accident occurred in the Deux-Sèvres region of western France on Monday. According to the Niort prosecutor’s office, their car collided with a heavy goods vehicle travelling in the opposite direction.
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