Naye our eink, our hasank

Featured in the 2025 Alliance Française French Film Festival

Born in Paris in 1924 as the son of Armenian refugees, Charles Aznavour’s formative years are spent in poverty, but distinguished by his parents’ passion for music and theatre. Ridiculed for his short stature and raspy tenor voice - traits he would in time fully embrace - Aznavour’s early attempts at a showbiz career during the Occupation falter. Whilst a gifted lyricist and storyteller, his material finds more success in the hands of others, including his friend Pierre, and later the imperious Edith Piaf, who becomes a highly influential mentor and supporter. But by the 1950s, Aznavour finally realises his own ambitions; his empathetic ‘chansons’ about the heartbreaks, confusions and passions of the common man (mining the dramas of his own life) catapult him to global attention.