The Other Side of the Border

A translator, writer, and publisher, as well as scriptwriter for TV, cinema, and comics, Jean-Luc Fromental has had broad experience in the book and audiovisual industries, frequently in connection with illustrators. His publishing career started with Jean-Claude Lattès, a prestigious French publishing house. Soon after, he became a critic for the newspaper "Le Matin de Paris" and co-wrote his first novel ("Le Système de l'homme mort") with François Landon.
He then moved to comics, and held a number of editorial positions before arriving at the legendary and progressive "Métal Hurlant" magazine. Meanwhile, his first comic scripts, done in partnership with illustrators like Yves Chaland ("La Main coupée") and Loustal ("Mémores avec dames"), started spreading. His career also includes several children's picture books such as "Oops!" and "365 penguins" (Abrams, 2010 and 2006), and scripts for movies, like "Loulou, l'incroyable secret, " which won the César, a prestigious French animation prize, in 2014.
He has most recently participated as a writer in "Le Coup de Prague" (Dupuis; "The Czech Coup, " Europe Comics), and "De l'autre côté de la frontière" (Dargaud; "The Other Side of the Border, " Europe Comics). Born outside of Paris on September 22nd, 1956, Philippe Berthet learned about drawing cartoons in Brussels from 1974 onwards, by attending courses held by Eddy Paape at the Saint-Gilles Academy and by Claude Renard at the Saint-Luc Institute.
Adopting the temporary pseudonym of "Philibert" for his first test pieces in "Le 9e rêve" in 1979, an anthology of the best work of the members of Atelier R, he then worked with his friend and fellow student, Antonio Cossu, on the magazine "Aïe!, " and then on "Spatial." He was taken on by the magazine "Spirou" in 1981 for "Couleur café" (based on a script by Antoine Andrieu), followed by "Hiver 51" and "Été 60" (written by Andréas), the "Privé d'Hollywood" trilogy, based on the detective stories by François Rivière and José-Louis Bocquet, "L'oeil du chasseur" with Philippe Foerster, and "La Dame, le cygne et l'ombre" with Dominique David.
In 1991, he illustrated a script by Tome ("Sur la route de Selma") for the prestigious Aire Libre collection at Dupuis and two years later, he presented "Halona, " his first complete work as an author. At the same time Berthet was working with his friend Cossu on producing the series "Marchand d'idées" at Glénat, a peculiar mix of two different styles. In 1994, his clear, linear drawing and sharp framing was used for the series "Pin-up" at Dargaud (Europe Comics in English, 2017), alongside the author Yann.
The story is a fictionalized account of the world of Betty Page, the queen of erotic photos in the 1940s and '50s. Deliciously retro, this series was initially intended to be a tribute to Milton Caniff and his comic strip "Male Call, " meant to entertain the GIs at war. More recently, Berthet has also collaborated with Zidrou on a tale of Australian crime fiction, "Le Crime qui est le tien" (Dargaud 2015, Europe Comics in English 2018), as well as Sylvain Runberg on the thriller "Motorcity" (Dargaud, Europe Comics 2017).
And in 2018, he teamed with scriptwriter Raule to explore the streets of Barcelona in "L'Art de mourir" (Dargaud; "The Art of Dying, " Europe Comics).