"Hello sir, you are indeed Gérard Depardieu, born on December 27, 1948, in Châteauroux?" The famous actor, clad in a dark suit, slowly stepped up to the stand to confirm his identity to Judge Thierry Donard. It was the beginning of his trial in Paris for alleged acts of sexual assault in 2021, on the set of Jean Becker's film Les Volets Verts ("The Green Shutters"), according to the two plaintiffs, a set designer and an assistant director.

Depardieu had announced that he intended to answer the court's questions, but, on the first day of his trial, Monday, March 24, only Jérémie Assous, his lawyer, spoke, monopolizing the floor and dominating the proceedings. On October 28, 2024, Assous had obtained a postponement of the trial, due to his client's ill health – he still can only appear for six hours a day at most. This time, Assous requested "the pure and simple annulment of the proceedings," at the end of a monologue that lasted almost two hours.

"This case embodies the absolute violation of the principle of the adversarial system and of fairness," he said, accusing the prosecutors of using "Stalinist methods." He singled out one police investigator in particular whom he said had "rushed" the probe and had left out exculpatory witnesses and contradictions in the plaintiffs' statements, among other grievances.

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