The Stage Manager (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories

This episode recounts the true murder of René Gorlin, a stage manager for French comedian Kalush (Coluche), who was executed in November 1980 after his boss launched a satirical presidential campaign. Inspector

Key takeaways

• René Gorlin was found shot twice in the back of the head at a muddy construction site outside Paris on November 25, 1980.
• Inspector Charles Diaz initially pursued political motives after learning comedian Kalush (Coluche) was receiving death threats for his presidential run.

Main topics

• Murder investigation & forensic analysis
• Polyamorous relationship dynamics & jealousy

Notable quotes

"The next one is for you."

Conclusion

The episode demonstrates how delayed forensic science and methodical re-

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) One afternoon in December of 1980, one of the most famous comedians in France pulled a stack of letters out of his mailbox in Paris. And as he flipped through the mail, one of the packages caught his eye. It had no postmark or return address, and there was clearly something small and hard inside of it. And so intrigued, he ripped open the envelope and he pulled out a bullet, along with a piece of paper that read, the next one is for you. But before we get into today's story... If you're a fan of the strange, dark, and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place because that's all we do. So if that's of interest to you, please sneak into the Follow Buttons house, steal the rotating plate in their microwave, and then leave. Okay, let's get into today's story. Speaker 1 (1:06) On the evening of November 23, 1980, a 39-year-old man named René Gorlin sat on a bench at a train station in Paris, France. His 22-year-old girlfriend, Marie-Pierre Desaubry, was sitting next to him, and the energy between them was tense. Because Marie-Pierre did not want René to get on the train that was about to arrive. So for the past few years, René had basically been living two separate lives. He spent most of his time in Paris, where he worked as the stage manager for a very famous comedian, and he lived in an apartment with Marie-Pierre. But the train he was waiting for now was about to take him back to his other life, which was on a farm 60 miles away in the town of Chateau-Thierry, where he lived with his longtime partner, Danielle, and their two kids. Now, having a relationship with two different women was often very complicated for René, but it really wasn't a secret. Both women knew about each other. So this was all out in the open. So in the beginning, the arrangement had been quite rocky because Renee, at the time, had been with Danielle exclusively for years before ever meeting Marie-Pierre and starting the affair. And when the affair began with Marie-Pierre, Danielle had been furious. Like, she couldn't believe this. But now, she had a boyfriend on the side too. And it seemed to Renée like she'd made peace with the whole situation and was at least reasonably happy with their overall arrangement. But Marie-Pierre, Renée's girlfriend in Paris who was currently sitting with him waiting for this train, was not fine with the overall arrangement. She'd always been very jealous of his relationship with Danielle. And things really had only gotten even messier lately because Marie-Pierre was now seven months pregnant. René had promised Marie-Pierre that he was going to leave Danielle and marry her, Marie-Pierre, as soon as the baby was born. But secretly, he wasn't sure if he'd actually go through with it. After all, Marie-Pierre had already left René twice before, and he was afraid to abandon his long-term family for a relationship that seemed somewhat unstable. But he still had time before he had to make a decision about any of that. Right now, he really was not looking to add any more drama into his personal life. He was already dealing with quite enough at work. So the very famous comedian that René worked for, whose stage name was Kalush, had announced a month ago that he was going to run for president of France. And even though the campaign was essentially a joke, the current president took Kalush really seriously. He viewed this comedian who, I mean, to everybody else, it seemed like a shtick. He viewed this campaign as an actual threat to his reelection. And now, a month after Coluche has announced this run for being the president, he was actually doing quite well in the polls, which was only increasing the paranoia by the current French political establishment. And so now it's like, you know, the powers that be in France were having this extreme reaction to Coluche, like, this guy is a threat to us. In fact, government agencies were now actually tapping Coluche's phone, and the state-run TV and radio stations. now suddenly wouldn't let him on the air. And on top of that, perhaps the most sort of frightening aspect of Kalush's political rise here was that at least one person had been sending him death threats. And so for René, it was sort of amazing to see Kalush's rise that started as sort of a joke and became something much more serious. But it was also sort of scary. René was worried that just in virtue of being Kalush's employee, he might be in danger too. And so now, as the train to Chateau Thierry finally pulled up to the platform, the only thing on René's mind was just holding his life together for another day. He kissed Marie-Pierre goodbye and told her to remember to lock the apartment door while he was gone, because again, you know, he's sort of worried about safety for him, safety for others near him. And then he said that if anything went wrong, she knew where the farm was where he was staying, and she knew how to get a hold of him. Speaker 1 (5:15) A couple hours later, after the train ride, Renee sat in the passenger seat of Danielle's car as she drove him back to the farm from the train station. It was now pretty late, and their two young kids were falling asleep in the back seat, so Renee and Danielle were not talking much. Up ahead, Renee saw their farm come into view. It was on a big plot of land in the countryside with dozens of horses and a little white stone farmhouse. It was beautiful. And as soon as he saw it, René breathed deeply and let his shoulders relax. You know, he was glad to be back here, away from all the chaos of Paris. They pulled onto the property, and Danielle parked the car in the driveway. And as she was getting the kids situated, René got out, and the first thing he did is he walked over to the stables to check on the horses. And as soon as he poked his head inside, he noticed that Danielle clearly had not groomed any of them while he was gone. And so Rene, he walked back to the house feeling kind of irritated. And once he was inside with Danielle and their kids, he couldn't help it. He had to ask her about it. Like, why didn't you do it? And Danielle instantly snapped back at him, saying that the horses being groomed were very low on her list of priorities. She'd been too busy taking care of their kids and the entire farm without him for a whole week. Rene was very defensive, and he argued right back. And pretty quickly, this fight escalated until they were both screaming at each other right in front of their kids. But this actually was not particularly unusual for Rene and Danielle. They had explosive arguments like this all the time, and they always just blew over eventually. So at the end of their, you know, initial volley of fighting, when there was kind of a lull there, Rene, you know, he's heated, he's full of adrenaline. But from experience, he knew the best thing for him to do right now was just to take a beat. So he stormed out of the room and headed to the bedroom to just cool down. Once inside, he sat down on the bed, and at first he just sat there, you know, seething, you know, still mad. And then he saw there was a phone on the nightstand, so he just picked it up, and almost reflexively, he dialed a number. And a moment later, Marie-Pierre answered. And before long... You know, René is venting to Marie-Pierre about Danielle. He told her that, you know, hey, we just got in this horrible fight. You know, pretty much the second I walked in the door, we're fighting about all this stupid stuff. Like, oh, you wouldn't believe it. And René, as he's venting about Danielle to his mistress of sorts, you know, he expected Marie-Pierre to ultimately sympathize with him. But instead, when Marie-Pierre responded to this diatribe about Danielle, she just sounded really frustrated. She said that, you know what, if you hate Danielle so much, just leave her already. Like, enough of this talk. Just leave her. And at first, Rene couldn't help but feel annoyed himself. Like, this suggestion was kind of offensive. Like, you understand how complicated this is. But then he actually considered that Marie-Pierre might be right. And then after he hung up the phone, he found himself sitting on that bed wondering if it was... really worth even spending the rest of the night here, just probably fighting some more with Danielle? Like, what good was that going to do? He began to think maybe he ought to just leave right now and go back to Paris with Marie-Pierre. And so for a few minutes, René just sat on the bed, weighing his options, basically