Did Mitterand slurp down a bird?

last updated 8 January 2015

Paris

Friends of the late French president François Mitterand have started a campaign to ban a film about his last days because one scene shows him gorging himself in a disgusting frenzy a week before his death. Filming has not yet begun, but millionaire Pierre Bergé vowed last week to block the movie after reading the script. The screenplay calls for the actor playing Mitterand to scarf down an ortolan, a tiny songbird that used to be revered as a delicacy when eaten whole—bones, beak, and all—but is now protected by French law. He then gobbles plate after plate of oysters. Bergé and other Mitterand friends insist the gluttonous display never happened.