Céline Dion

In her kooky, rambunctious biopic “Aline,” the French comedian Valérie Lemercier drew from her own life to play the Quebecois pop star at every stage of ...

“I fought one of the film’s backers, who did not want to hear of them.” Among those actors was Sylvain Marcel, who played the Angélil character (renamed Guy-Claude Kamar) and thus had to help sell the romance between the singer and a man nearly 30 years her senior. “It’s probably the most realistic scene in the entire movie,” she said. “She does not treat Celine Dion as a pop object, either, like Jeff Koons did with Cicciolina,” he added, referring to the provocateur artist’s relationship with his former wife and muse. Early in the process, Lemercier passed on her script to Dion’s French manager, whom she said approved of the tone; a spokesperson stated in an email that “Celine has not seen the movie, nor does she have any comments about it.”) “For me, it’s the pleasure of making people laugh, and for her, it’s the pleasure of singing.” “I’m often asked why I played her as a child, and I often say I’m like a lawyer defending her client: I’m not going to send out my assistant to handle the beginning, when it’s tough,” she said. “I wanted to be sincere, to do an open love letter.” (Some of Dion’s siblings have criticized the film for, among other things, what they felt was a cartoonish portrayal of their family. It was through one of her solo outings, in the mid-1990s, that she was converted to the church of Celine. “I was doing a show at the Théâtre de Paris, and an usher, who was a Celine fan, sang me her songs,” Lemercier recalled. “Everybody assumed I was going to make a parody, but that was never my plan,” Lemercier said of “Aline.” “I’m not much for tenderness; it really bugs me, generally speaking, and I tend to go more for sarcasm. She decided to make a film about the star after spotting her at the funeral for Angélil, who died in 2016. This would not have surprised audiences in France, where “Aline” came out in November, because Lemercier, known for her biting comic style, has long portrayed children in TV sketches and in her one-woman performances; in one of her signatures sketches, she plays a twitchy contestant on a kids’ talent show. Among the many flourishes was the decision by Lemercier, 58, to play Aline at every stage in her life — including as a 5-year-old, with a little C.G.I. and forced-perspective tricks.