The ‘Clooney effect’ hasn’t affected my village in Provence

My eldest daughter’s husband is from Como. In the early 2000s George Clooney caused a stir in the town when he bought a villa on the lakeside nearby, triggering what’s become known as the Clooney effect — a rise in house prices and the number of “bougie” shops and restaurants catering for an increasing number of visitors. Rather than take a boat trip and gawp at the Villa Oleandra, visitors would be better heading to Gardone on Lake Garda and visiting Gabriele D’Annunzio’s insane Il Vittoriale.

Unlike Clooney, D’Annunzio (1863-1938), whose motto was “Me ne frego” (I don’t give a damn), was a short, ugly, almost blind, toothless early 20th-century proto-communist/fascist war hero. He was also a dramatist and poet who, in his seventies, claimed to be still enjoying drug-fueled orgies. I’d bet my cave that his house, which I visited with my young family 20 years ago, is more interesting than George’s.

A year or so ago, Clooney and his wife Amal bought a house half an hour away from the village in Provence where I’ve lived for ten years. Sometimes they eat at the Jardin Secret, part of our posh new hotel and restaurant complex, Lou Calen. My daughter and son-in-law dined there the evening that Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race and saw the Clooneys in the next room. They’ve decided that George is following them around Europe, although it’s doubtful that he’ll be buying a house in their hometown of Paisley any time soon.

I first came here in 2008. Even then it was busy, but gently so. The restaurants were plentiful and full; the best were meters away from the four-story village house on the Cours we rented for the following six years. There was a DJ in the corner of the square every Friday night where my then teenage daughters and I, plus half the village, danced to an unchanging playlist that began with Elvis and ended with the Black Eyed Peas. The girls were on Desperados (a filthy drink), and I was on rosé.

There’s been a rock concert in the village every year since 2009 (apart from in Covid times) featuring a German cover band, Five and the Red One. I’ve been in the mosh pit, jumping up and down, singing my heart out, every year. Latterly Jeremy came with me and loved it too. One year he got spectacularly drunk, something he rarely did with me — because, he said, he didn’t need or want to. He was six inches taller, and a pleasingly muscular four and a half stone heavier than me, so I soon gave up trying to stop him falling over, instead offering a hand to hold and helpful counsel. “Darling — watch your glasses! Your teeth! Your head!”

Last year was the first Village du Rock since Covid, and the first without Jeremy. I was house-sitting a place three miles outside the village, and drove. I met friends and we jostled into our usual position near the front. The band played every rock anthem you can think of, including “Sweet Child of Mine,” “You Shook Me All Night Long,” “Satisfaction,” and the crowd’s favorite, a frenetic singalong version of “Twist and Shout.” Close to midnight they played a new number for them, one of Jeremy and my favorites, Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here.”

I stopped dancing, let my chin fall to my chest, my eyes fill with tears, and pushed my way out of the crowd back to the car. No key. Thinking it had bounced out of my bag while I was jumping up and down, I went back and searched for it among the dancing feet. A young girl spotted it under the stage. It had been kicked right to the back. I kissed her, then ran to the roped off “VIP” area to negotiate in appalling French with one of the bouncers. Permission granted, I ducked the barrier and crawled, almost in time to AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell,” to retrieve it.

Would the festival be different this year? Newspapers have run columns about the village and the famous people who have second homes here. The Sunday Times ran a piece reporting a 27 percent increase in house prices which, going by what we’ve heard — that some houses are selling at a loss — is a figure we doubt. Lou Calen has opened up fully and there’s a new wealthier coterie on the Cours. A few expressionless, achingly beautiful automatons have been spotted floating up the Cours looking bored and avoiding eye contact with the rest of us.

I needn’t have worried. This year’s rock concert crowd was the same as ever: slightly grubby, sweaty, energetic, affectionate and loud. The band was sensational. The lead singer is now in his late thirties and, with his voice, his guitar-playing, his Robert Plant curls, his moves and smile, he is textbook rock star. After it was over a DJ came on and I joined friends under a plane tree and danced some more. Geoffrey, who’s lived in France for most of his life and speaks perfect French, seemed altered. He’d had a spiritual connection with the tree he was leaning against, he told us, and felt at one with the universe.

I turned and saw the lead singer beside me. We got chatting; his name was David. He took me to the bar and got us a drink. I told him about the girls and me dancing all those years ago and how Jeremy wrote about the band in 2017.

He gave me a hug. “Do you think the village still likes us? Are they bored?” he said. “Are you kidding? You saw us. This is the best night of the year for the village. We love you!”

This article was originally published in The Spectator’s UK magazine. Subscribe to the World edition here.