Notre petite ambassade, Ep. 1 & 2

Notre petite ambassade (Our Little Embassy) popped up recently in my France 3 feed, it’s a 2025 sitcom about the staff of a Swiss embassy somewhere in South America. The series’ original title is Unsere Kleine Botschaft, so it’s from the German-speaking segment of Switzerland, and what France 3 is showing is dubbed into French (except for some in-context Spanish).


MISC

The cast includes Cristo Fernandez, who was Dani on Ted Lasso.

According to Cineuropa, this was the first Swiss sitcom in 20 years.

It was canceled after this first season, due to low ratings.

The Federal Council is Switzerland’s ministerial cabinet, the seven members are the collective chief executive of the country.


Notre petite ambassade (Our Little Embassy) Ep. 1, “L'échec fait partie du succès” (The Success Game), runtime 21:40
Subtitles download link

Béa Laïtenegger (Susanne Kunz) is Switzerland’s ambitious ambassador to an unnamed South American country. She’s just finalized an agreement for building a Swiss train to take coffee beans to a seaport, when the Swiss bureaucracy rains on her parade: the Federal official being sent to sign the accord is her ex-husband.

Ambassador Béa (Susanne Kunz, r) and Lupe her assistant/fixer (Darinka Ezeta)

NOTES

4’12”: Well-done fake photo of Béa and her ex-husband meeting Barack Obama.

There is no one named Follie

My new semi-regular thread Rewatch Project kicks off with “Follie’s,” what I feel is the best episode so far of my favorite French mystery, Capitaine Marleau. I’ve watched the episode again and made a number of changes– some retranslations, some formatting improvements, and application of my current stylebook.


Capitaine Marleau #30 “Follie’s” (2023), runtime 1:37:03
Subtitles download link

Marleau is basking in the glow of news reports about her capture of an escaped fugitive. She’s about to head off down the road when a woman stops her in the commissariat lobby begging her to find her missing daughter, Sylvie. Marleau’s boss pro temps Cmdr. Duchesne had been less than helpful when Sylvie’s disappearance was originally reported, owing to her being a stripper (under the stage name Sunlight) at the local cabaret, Follie’s. Duchesne shares some choice insults about Follie’s’s colorful staff, at which point Marleau decides they must be her kind of people.

However the Follie’s family closes ranks, indicating Sunlight isn’t missing so much as hiding. There are also corrupt politicians and businessmen, sex tapes, and a blackmailer who is as scarce as Sunlight. So Marleau and her assistant Melissa– and to an equal extent Vincent, Sunlight’s roommate– have to do it the hard way: by annoying the hell out of the suspects one by one.


MISC

I originally posted the translation for “Follie’s” on August 27, 2023. Yes, MHZ is way behind.

What makes “Follie's” so wonderful, the apostrophe notwithstanding?

• The sheer volume of work that must have gone into it: it's two episodes, a mystery and a musical.
• The Easter eggs.
• The world inside Follie's and the connections Marleau builds with the inhabitants.
• Bugs Bunny vs. Yosemite Sam- I mean Marleau vs. Duchesne.

Catherine Ringer (Rosa) is a multi-talented singer/songwriter/actor/musician, who also had a career in adult films and traded insults about it with Serge Gainsbourg on TV.

Samuel Mercer (Vincent) played Samuel Muir in the first Marleau series episode, “Philippe Muir.”

Zahia Dehar (Sunlight) first entered the public eye in 2010, when she was arrested in connection with a prostitution investigation involving footballers, and again in 2020 when the case was reopened.

Why did I think translating a 26-year-old episode would be fun?

It’s the second anniversary of Translation Notes.

Florence Larrieu: La juge est une femme (Florence Larrieu: The Judge is a Woman), “Suspectes,” 2000, runtime 95:21
Subtitles download link

MHZ recently posted the final episodes of Alice Nevers: The Judge is a Woman, moving the long-running series from Paris to Normandy, where Alice and Fred go for their perfect life together. Alice brought the kids but not her clerk, who shows up briefly in the epilogue. Fred didn’t bring his partner Karim, which is just as well as since Karim would probably be afraid of the horses in the final case.

Before Alice’s arrival in 2002 the show went by the name Florence Larrieu: The Judge is a Woman. Apparently female judges were such a rarity that the fact had to be part of the title. Florence Pernel played Judge Larrieu for 17 episodes between 1993 and 2002. I have this joke that there are only 12 actors in France, because the same actors keep popping up over and over. Well, Florence Pernel is three or four of them. If you watch a lot of French TV like I do, she seems to be everywhere.

Florence Pernel, with Frederic Diefenthal

I got it off YouTube. Because it’s 26 years old the audio is not all one would hope for, much of the higher registers are fried or blown out. When I couldn’t make out what was being said, Vosk was usually no help; I did my best.

The episode is titled “Suspectes”: Larrieu and her assistant Lt. Colas investigate when hardened robber Jackie breaks out of a women's prison, in which the inmates are contract employees for a tech company. A guard dies during the escape. Jackie just wants to see her daughter but also denies being the killer, as well as the earlier robbery. Will the tech company get any blame, or is it a red herring? Will Florence and Colas ever stop bickering like siblings?


MISC

The Judge is a Woman was created by Noelle Loriot based on her trilogy of Laurence Larrieu crime novels— so, prior to Nevers all the names had to rhyme.

Larrieu was the judge for seasons 1-7, Nevers for seasons 8-26.

The only character present for both judges was Édouard Lemonnier, their clerk, played by Jean Dell (seasons 1-9). Édouard’s nephew Victor (Guillaume Carcaud) became the clerk for seasons 9-26.

Lt. Victor Colas was played by Frederic Diefenthal (Meurtres à Rouen). He was with the show 1993-2001, and “Suspectes” is from Season 5. But at 21’45” he mentions that he and Florence’s partnership is still new.

There’s a cut in the video at 43’21”, probably done by whoever posted it. Of course this affects the subtitles sync for viewers who might have the uncut version.


NOTES

Surveillante (5’22”) can be translated as ‘matron,’ but it feels dated.
      The prosecutor asks Florence au moins que c'est au plus vite (At least do it ASAP). Or it could be au manque c'est au plus vite– something like ‘we’ll be short (handed?), be quick.’ As though someone had announced their departure in the previous episode.
      Which might help explain when Florence replies trois jours, ‘three days’ (5’27”). Whatever that meant, the prosecutor doesn’t seem thrilled.