Kaamelott
Encyclopedia
Kaamelott is a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 television series running originally 2005–2009. It combines medieval fantasy and comedy to present a new "realistic epic" version of the Arthurian legend.

While the series takes place in the 5th century, it uses modern language and situations to create a humorous view of the Arthurian legend, even in the fifth season (or "book") when the mood becomes darker and more dramatic as Arthur's kingdom begins to disintegrate.

The whole series is written and directed by Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier is a French writer, director, editor and actor.He is most known as the writer, editor, director and lead actor of the French television series Kaamelott, in which he also plays King Arthur....

, who also stars as King Arthur and composes all the music for the show.

The series was preceded in 2003 by a short movie, Dies iræ, that the show's creator, Alexandre Astier, wrote and directed. Dies irae featured mostly the same cast as the TV series and followed the same concept. It was used to pitch the idea of the series to the M6 television network, at a time when M6 was looking to replace another successful short TV series, Caméra Café
Caméra Café
Caméra Café is a French-born concept of comedy television series exported around the world. A movie spin-off has been made in France under the title of Espace détente...

. However, Kaamelott exceeded Caméra Cafés audience only three weeks after broadcasting started.

Format and broadcast

The episode format for Kaamelott was at first very short. Unaired pilot episodes attempted a six-minute format that was rejected by the television network. Broadcast episodes from season 1 to 4 lasted about three and a half minutes, the same as Caméra Café. These seasons are made up of a hundred of these short episodes, and originally seven such seasons were planned by Astier and M6. A season is referred to as a "livre", which means "book", in the promotional material and DVD covers.

The episodes were broadcast on M6
Métropole 6
M6, also known as Metropole television, is the most profitable private national French TV channel and the third most watched television network in the French-speaking world...

 in France starting in 2005 in prime time
Prime time
Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast programming during the middle of the evening for television programing.The term prime time is often defined in terms of a fixed time period—for example, from 19:00 to 22:00 or 20:00 to 23:00 Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast...

 (8:30PM to 8:40PM), two every weeknight evening for seasons 1-4. The week's full ten episodes were aired on the Saturday of that same week. Each such season lasted ten weeks. A week's worth of episodes is about 35 minutes, which is comparable to the American one-hour network format of ca. 44 minutes or to the British half-hour format of 30 minutes. Each episode features a teaser, opening titles, three acts, closing titles and a tag, like an American sitcom episode. Season 1 aired early in 2005, 2 in fall 2005, 3 early in 2006, and 4 in fall 2006.

Each season attracted more viewers, with records reaching about 5 million viewers each evening.

The first half of Season 5 aired in spring 2007 as two 52-minute episodes, followed by 5 weeks of 7-minute episodes (telling the same story, but with additional material) presented on the same schedule as the earlier seasons. The second half followed the same format in the fall of 2007.

Season 4 was the first season that really told a story. Whereas in the earlier seasons one could watch the short episodes in any order, in Season 4 more than half the episodes were connected to a plot (and episodes 99 and 100 form a single long episode with no break). Season 5 has several intertwining plots which are presented chronologically through the whole season. This presented storytelling and editing problems which were incompatible with the old 3½-minute format, and has resulted in at least 3 different versions of Season 5: 3 52-minute episodes as televised, 50 7-minute episodes as televised, 8 longer episodes in the DVD "director's cut." Season 6 was always, from the time shooting began, conceived of as a series of 40-minute episodes which would be presented as a miniseries, not cut up into shorter episodes.

Around the time that shooting began on Season 6, Astier announced that there would be no Season 7. Season 6 consists of a prequel (how Arthur became king of Britain) followed by an episode which is a sequel to Season 5.

Season 6 had a theatrical premiere as part of the "Paris fait sa comédie" festival, with a showing of seven episodes at the Grand Rex theater on March 25, 2009. The Livre was shown on M6 in October and November 2009, as a series of nine 40-minute episodes, three each Saturday night. The ratings for Livre 6 were relatively low (2.2-2.65 million), perhaps because the DVD was expected to hit the market almost immediately afterwards.

The series has also been shown on TSR2
Télévision Suisse Romande
Télévision Suisse Romande is a TV network with 2 channels: TSR 1 and TSR 2. They are the main French language channels in Switzerland, part of SRG SSR idée suisse...

 in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

, on Club RTL
Club RTL
-Programs:* Hannah Montana* The Simpsons* Handy Manny* Heroes* Phineas and Ferb...

 in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

 and on Historia
Historia
Historia is a Canadian French language Category A specialty channel which presents informative and entertainment programming related to history in the form of dramas, films, documentaries, human interests programs and more...

 in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

.

Astier hopes to follow the television series with a trilogy of films about Arthur. He has said that the last episode of Season 6 prepares the audience for the movie series.

Production

From the beginning, the series was shot in a widescreen format and the photography was comparable to movie quality. Thus in appearance the film is a drama rather than a sitcom.

As the series goes on, there are more and more exteriors. Seasons 1-4 take place almost entirely in or near the fortress of Kaamelott. For the first two seasons, the interiors were shot in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, but production moved to Lyon
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....

 for the third season (entailing changes in some sets, particularly Merlin's Laboratory). The castle exteriors are filmed at a medieval castle near Lyon. Parts of Seasons 5 and 6 were filmed in Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...

, and some of Season 6 was filmed in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 at the Cinecittà
Cinecittà
Cinecittà is a large film studio in Rome that is considered the hub of Italian cinema.-History:The studios were founded in 1937 by Benito Mussolini and his head of cinema Luigi Freddi for propaganda purposes, under the slogan "Il cinema è l'arma più forte"...

 Studios on the sets built for HBO's Rome
Rome (TV series)
Rome is a British-American–Italian historical drama television series created by Bruno Heller, John Milius and William J. MacDonald. The show's two seasons premiered in 2005 and 2007, and were later released on DVD. Rome is set in the 1st century BC, during Ancient Rome's transition from Republic...

.

The shooting schedule for 100 episodes was 50 days in the early seasons, expanding later to 60 days; Astier prepares the scenarios for the entire season ahead of time. In order to shoot as economically and quickly as possible, all the scenes using a particular set (especially exteriors) are shot consecutively. This gives each season an individual texture, since an exterior setting will always have the same weather, more or less, and characters wear the same clothing in a particular setting when it reappears in various episodes. The last 12 episodes of Season 2 were shot at the same time as the Season 3 episodes.

Costuming continuity is achieved in the first seasons simply by having the principal characters dressed the same in nearly every episode. Knights seated at the Round Table wear armor in the first four seasons, and in the first season they also wear armor in battle exteriors. Through the first five seasons, though new costumes are introduced, Karadoc usually wears red, Perceval blue, Lancelot off-white, and Bohort green (in a few episodes, Sir Herve appears in a yellow costume). Arthur wears blacks with deep reds and purples; Leodagan gray or gray-blue and black.

Astier usually writes the actual dialogue the night before a scene is shot. Thus if a three-minute episode includes an exterior scene, a scene in a bedroom, and a scene in the hallway, the actors would be learning their lines for the episode (along with the lines for other bits of episodes using that set) on three different days.

Content

The series title refers of course to Arthur's fortress Camelot; the peculiar spelling may come from the Old French Kamaalot, a spelling which can be found in the 13th-century French Lancelot-Grail
Lancelot-Grail
The Lancelot–Grail, also known as the Prose Lancelot, the Vulgate Cycle, or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is a major source of Arthurian legend written in French. It is a series of five prose volumes that tell the story of the quest for the Holy Grail and the romance of Lancelot and Guinevere...

 cyclical romances. The double A forms the monogram of the show's creator, and the title generates puns based on the French word camelote ("cheap junk").

Genre

The short format of the first four seasons demanded a comic structure, with each episode ending on an ironic note of some kind which would twist the situation presented into a memorable whole. Thus the series was perceived as pure comedy—parody, satire, sitcom, or “so British,” meaning a straight-faced historical send-up in the style of Rowan Atkinson’s Blackadder
Blackadder
Blackadder is the name that encompassed four series of a BBC1 historical sitcom, along with several one-off instalments. All television programme episodes starred Rowan Atkinson as anti-hero Edmund Blackadder and Tony Robinson as Blackadder's dogsbody, Baldrick...

 or Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a 1974 British comedy film written and performed by the comedy group Monty Python , and directed by Gilliam and Jones...

. Astier had a lot of explaining to do when Season 5 turned out to have a very dark plot, full of terrible obsessions and passions. Season 5 also involved a move towards a different format; it was broadcast both in short format and in longer sections, and the DVD cut resembled a dramatic miniseries. Season 6 was conceived and edited only in a miniseries format, with long episodes telling a story that is primarily dramatic, with incidental comic elements.

Fantasy elements have been limited, undoubtedly to some extent by the budget. However, a few episodes suggest the possibility of an intersection of the traditional Arthurian world of fairies and wizards with science fiction (see the description of Perceval's character below).

Historical and traditional content

Although the show was at first perceived as pure comedy, in many ways it follows the medieval Arthurian legends, including such traditional characters as Lancelot
Lancelot
Sir Lancelot du Lac is one of the Knights of the Round Table in the Arthurian legend. He is the most trusted of King Arthur's knights and plays a part in many of Arthur's victories...

, Guenièvre
Guinevere
Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot...

, Bohort (Bors
Bors
Bors circa 540s-580s, is the name of two knights in the Arthurian legend, one the father and one the son. Bors the Elder is the King of Gaunnes or Gaul during the early period of King Arthur's reign, and is the brother of King Ban of Benoic. Gaunnes is the Fredemundian dynastic kingdom of Neustria...

), Perceval
Percival
Percival or Perceval is one of King Arthur's legendary Knights of the Round Table. In Welsh literature his story is allotted to the historical Peredur...

, Merlin
Merlin
Merlin is a legendary figure best known as the wizard featured in the Arthurian legend. The standard depiction of the character first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, written c. 1136, and is based on an amalgamation of previous historical and legendary figures...

, and the Lady of the Lake
Lady of the Lake
The Lady of the Lake is the name of several related characters who play parts in the Arthurian legend. These characters' roles include giving King Arthur his sword Excalibur, enchanting Merlin, and raising Lancelot after the death of his father...

, as well as the Holy Grail
Holy Grail
The Holy Grail is a sacred object figuring in literature and certain Christian traditions, most often identified with the dish, plate, or cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper and said to possess miraculous powers...

 and the sword Excalibur
Excalibur
Excalibur is the legendary sword of King Arthur, sometimes attributed with magical powers or associated with the rightful sovereignty of Great Britain. Sometimes Excalibur and the Sword in the Stone are said to be the same weapon, but in most versions they are considered separate. The sword was...

. The early seasons often include twists on traditional Arthurian or medieval themes which might delight scholars; historians Eric Le Nabour and Martin Aurell have published two books based on the series, and a number of distinguished medievalists are interviewed in the 5-part documentary "Aux sources de Kaamelott" by Christophe Chabert, which accompanies the DVD sets.

Like other 21st-century Arthurian versions such as King Arthur
King Arthur (film)
King Arthur is a 2004 film directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by David Franzoni. It stars Clive Owen as the title character, Ioan Gruffudd as Lancelot, and Keira Knightley as Guinevere....

 and The Last Legion
The Last Legion
The Last Legion is a 2007 film directed by Doug Lefler. Produced by Dino De Laurentiis and others, it is based on a 2003 Italian novel of the same name written by Valerio Massimo Manfredi...

, this one emphasizes Arthur's ties with Rome and its empire. In Season 1 of Kaamelott, several characters speak of adventures in Rome, but Arthur does not seem to like Roman art, food, etc.; however, in subsequent seasons his Roman connections become important to his character and history. Season 6 tells the story of how Arthur, a policeman in Rome, comes to understand his destiny and take the crown of Britain.

Traditionally Arthurian romance includes fantasy elements, but Astier may intend to connect these eventually to science fiction. He includes references to Stargate
Stargate
Stargate is a adventure military science fiction franchise, initially conceived by Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin. The first film in the franchise was simply titled Stargate. It was originally released on October 28, 1994, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Carolco, and became a hit, grossing nearly...

 (Perceval travels through one in episodes in Livres 2 and 3) and Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...

 (in the Livre 3 Stargate episode, Perceval visits Tatooine and brings back a light-saber, which Arthur perceives as much like Excalibur; also, in Livre 1, Bohort, the minister of protocol, sometimes seems very much like C-3PO
C-3PO
C-3PO is a robot character from the Star Wars universe who appears in both the original Star Wars films and the prequel trilogy. He is also a major character in the television show Droids, and appears frequently in the series' "Expanded Universe" of novels, comic books, and video games...

!). The first episode entitled "Silbury Hill" suggests the operation of spiritual beings everywhere in Britain, but "Silbury Hill II" implies these are extraterrestrials and that this is known to Arthur and Léodagan. In Livre VI, we learn that Perceval was found as a baby in a crop circle, which, if these are made by space travellers from other planets, explains his affinity for stargates. Supernatural beings encountered by Arthur include Morgan Le Fay
Morgan le Fay
Morgan le Fay , alternatively known as Morgane, Morgaine, Morgana and other variants, is a powerful sorceress in the Arthurian legend. Early works featuring Morgan do not elaborate her character beyond her role as a fay or magician...

 (not his sister, but involved with his eventual fate), Méléagant the emissary of gods who seem to want to destroy human rulers, and his guide the Lady of the Lake
Lady of the Lake
The Lady of the Lake is the name of several related characters who play parts in the Arthurian legend. These characters' roles include giving King Arthur his sword Excalibur, enchanting Merlin, and raising Lancelot after the death of his father...

; at the beginning of Livre VI.2, a meeting of the gods whom the Lady of the Lake represents is depicted on Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Centaurus...

, which implies that they at least are beings whose home is "the stars" rather than on earth. Thus, rather than recording relationships between humans and fairies, Kaamelott seems to posit relationships between Arthur and superior beings from other parts of the universe.

Like all Arthurian stories, Kaamelott twists history as well, and adds its own view of where Arthur came from and what his reign means. Roman Britain
Roman Britain
Roman Britain was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire from AD 43 until ca. AD 410.The Romans referred to the imperial province as Britannia, which eventually comprised all of the island of Great Britain south of the fluid frontier with Caledonia...

 had contributed armies, generals, and maybe an emperor to the Roman empire; but in Kaamelott, Britain is an aggregate of kingdoms which perceives Rome as an occupying force and Arthur perhaps as a Pétain
Philippe Pétain
Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Joseph Pétain , generally known as Philippe Pétain or Marshal Pétain , was a French general who reached the distinction of Marshal of France, and was later Chief of State of Vichy France , from 1940 to 1944...

 for having made peace with the Romans. The enemies of the historical Britons in the 5th century were the Picts
Picts
The Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...

 to the north, the Irish (aka the Scots
Scoti
Scoti or Scotti was the generic name used by the Romans to describe those who sailed from Ireland to conduct raids on Roman Britain. It was thus synonymous with the modern term Gaels...

), and the north-Germanic tribes (Angles
Angles
The Angles is a modern English term for a Germanic people who took their name from the ancestral cultural region of Angeln, a district located in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany...

, Saxons
Saxons
The Saxons were a confederation of Germanic tribes originating on the North German plain. The Saxons earliest known area of settlement is Northern Albingia, an area approximately that of modern Holstein...

, and Jutes
Jutes
The Jutes, Iuti, or Iutæ were a Germanic people who, according to Bede, were one of the three most powerful Germanic peoples of their time, the other two being the Saxons and the Angles...

) who had originally been brought in as mercenaries to fight the Picts. Arthur enters history as the victor of twelve battles of the British against the Saxons and is also often depicted fighting the Picts and the Scots in the north. Astier’s Arthur, by contrast, apparently stays close to his fortress Kaamelott, where he is attacked by Angles and Saxons but also by Attila and his Hun, Burgundians
Burgundians
The Burgundians were an East Germanic tribe which may have emigrated from mainland Scandinavia to the island of Bornholm, whose old form in Old Norse still was Burgundarholmr , and from there to mainland Europe...

, Ostrogoths, Vandals
Vandals
The Vandals were an East Germanic tribe that entered the late Roman Empire during the 5th century. The Vandals under king Genseric entered Africa in 429 and by 439 established a kingdom which included the Roman Africa province, besides the islands of Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia and the Balearics....

, Vikings, Visigoths—just about every "barbarian" people that was on the move in Europe then (though Attila was active earlier and the Vikings later), except for the Franks
Franks
The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...

, ancestors of the French (though a historically Frankish leader, Chlodoric
Chlodoric the Parricide
Chlodoric the Patricide murdered his own father, Sigobert the Lame, in order to take his kingdom. Chlodoric acted upon the instigation of Clovis I a rival king of the Salian Franks. After Sigobert's death Clovis then accused Chlodoric of the murder and had him killed in his turn for the crime...

, does lead "barbarians" against Arthur). The Picts, however, represented by Arthur’s mother-in-law Séli, and the Irish, represented by a federated king, are Arthur’s allies in Kaamelott. The geopolitics of Kaamelott resembles that of the comic book world of Asterix
Asterix
Asterix or The Adventures of Asterix is a series of French comic books written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo . The series first appeared in French in the magazine Pilote on October 29, 1959...

--a small, primitive "Celtic" society with its druid, warrior, and secret weapon, persisting on the edges of the Roman Empire—more than traditional English or American versions of the Arthur story.

Comic devices

The main comical device of the series is to explore the distance between conventional "epic" presentations of Arthurian legend and the actual day-to-day operations of Arthur and his knights as they seek the holy Grail. Arthur is surrounded by incompetent, lazy knights, easily frightened or distracted, who fail most of their missions or who end up finding but then discarding invaluable artifacts, not understanding the nature of their quest. They speak an everyday language, full of slang and not very articulate; when someone does try to express a complex idea in a complex and exact way, he (usually Arthur, sometimes Bohort) is usually not understood and comes off as rather silly. Moreover, the characters all use the formal second person to address each other—a grammatical feature not present in English, but which produces a hilarious contrast between rude or slangy comments and the formality of expression: “Scram, sir,” or “Get in the tub with me, sir—you’re filthy” or “Madam, you are a fish-faced trollop.” The verbal comedy is often pointed up by having the characters talking with their mouths full.

The series also uses slapstick for humor (e.g. a cream-cheese fight in Season 3 “La Grande Bataille”), and running gags, which may be verbal (“La Botte Secrète,” the use of the phrase “You're not wrong” to keep up one end of a conversation one does not understand), physical (“Unagi,” the completely absurd martial arts developed by Karadoc and Perceval; the silly caps the characters wear to bed), musical (the song "A la volette" which recurs through the first season), or character-specific (Merlin’s conflict between his role as healer-scientist and the court’s idea of a magician, Karadoc’s truly Gargantuan need for food, Arthur interrupted in his bath by various incursions). There is no sexual romance; none of the knights seems very interested in women (or other men), and Arthur’s relations with his various mistresses is more a comic device than a matter of emotion. Guinièvre, for a reason left mysterious in the first 5 seasons, remains a virgin, and this too is a source of comedy as she tries to figure out, for example, why she can’t get pregnant. As the characters become familiar, dramatic or emotional situations can arise from this kind of comedy.

The series occasionally gives humorous (but always possible) explanations for historical facts. For instance, Kaamelott explains the creation of the national attire of Scotland, the kilt, by a misfortune of the king of Caledonia (modern Scotland). His armor's legs rusted when he fell into some water. It turns out to be a rule that a knight of the Round Table must wear either full body armor or his national attire, so the king of Caledonia wraps a cloth around his waist and declares it his country's official attire.

Social and psychological problems

The comic skits sometimes include serious reflections on themes like war
War
War is a state of organized, armed, and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or other parties typified by extreme aggression, social disruption, and usually high mortality. War should be understood as an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political...

, patriarchy
Patriarchy
Patriarchy is a social system in which the role of the male as the primary authority figure is central to social organization, and where fathers hold authority over women, children, and property. It implies the institutions of male rule and privilege, and entails female subordination...

, capital punishment
Capital punishment
Capital punishment, the death penalty, or execution is the sentence of death upon a person by the state as a punishment for an offence. Crimes that can result in a death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. The term capital originates from the Latin capitalis, literally...

 and bureaucracy
Bureaucracy
A bureaucracy is an organization of non-elected officials of a governmental or organization who implement the rules, laws, and functions of their institution, and are occasionally characterized by officialism and red tape.-Weberian bureaucracy:...

, among many others. The lead character, King Arthur of Britain (or Logres), has very progressive ideas, and tries to abolish the slave trade, torture, and capital punishment. His ideas usually clash with those of his father-in-law and minister of war and justice, Léodagan "Le Sanguinaire"("the Bloodthirsty"). Arthur also clashes with Lancelot, his prime minister and chief of staff, who believes that the Round Table and the Grail Quest should be for an elite, not for the self-selected group of rather ordinary men who have answered Arthur’s call. Both Léodagan and Lancelot are exasperated by the shenanigans of the so-called knights, and Arthur is torn between admitting they are pretty useless and insisting that they are worthy of the Grail.

Even the idiotic characters, however, are given qualities that explain Arthur's patience with them, and make them more likable and interesting to the viewer. For instance, Perceval of Wales first appears in medieval literature in the work of Chretien de Troyes
Chrétien de Troyes
Chrétien de Troyes was a French poet and trouvère who flourished in the late 12th century. Perhaps he named himself Christian of Troyes in contrast to the illustrious Rashi, also of Troyes...

 as the destined Grail Knight, but also a clumsy and foolish boy. In Kaamelott, he is the only character besides Arthur for whom Excalibur glows when it is picked up. But he is the least confident of the knights, and for good reason. He is not sure of his own name. He fails almost every mission he is trusted to undertake. He is illiterate, cannot understand the concept of a map, and insists North and South are relative concepts. On the other hand, he loves and is extremely faithful to Arthur. In Book 5, Arthur puts Excalibur back into the stone as a way of showing challengers to the throne, coming from all over the country to try to take the magical sword back out again, that only he is the rightful king. Some of Arthur's knights and allies do try their luck with the sword, but Perceval refuses and convinces his fellow knight Karadoc to do the same. Astier has described Perceval as “naïve but lucid” and (provocatively) as “the most intelligent” of the knights in his analysis of the sword in the stone situation. Perceval dreams of space travel and at one point tries to explain the theory of special relativity to Arthur. He also has the ability to count, at a glance, people or objects (such as the stones in the fortress of Kaamelott) and to grasp the "values" of cards or objects in complicated games. In Livre 6, we learn one possible explanation for Perceval's peculiarities: his parents found him in a crop circle
Crop circle
A crop circle is a sizable pattern created by the flattening of a crop such as wheat, barley, rye, maize, or rapeseed. Crop circles are also referred to as crop formations, because they are not always circular in shape. While the exact date crop circles began to appear is unknown, the documented...

; in Livre III.i.22, it is strongly implied that crop circles are made by visiting extraterrestrials. So he may not be human at all.

Plot

The plot of the series up through Season 5 involves a conflict between King Arthur and his best knight, Lancelot. This begins with a few episodes in Season 1 in which we see that Lancelot is in love with Arthur's queen, Guinièvre. In Season 2 Lancelot begins to challenge Arthur; he feels that if Arthur were an effective king, justice would have been established and the knights of the Round Table would be great warriors instead of the clowns ("pantins") they actually are. In Season 3 Lancelot decides to go live in the woods as a "chevalier errant" or wandering knight, and in Season 4 his hermitage becomes a fortress and he begins recruiting men. In Season 4, Guenièvre joins Lancelot and Arthur breaks various “laws” by trying to remarry; however, at the end he retrieves his wife, who has had enough of camping out, and Lancelot despairs. Season 5's main plots show Lancelot and Arthur separately voyaging into their own pasts and futures as their conflict builds to a real cliffhanger in the final episode. We learn that these two men have been in competition for the throne of Britain since they were born. In Season 5, also, Arthur resigns his kingship and Leodagan and Karadoc attempt to rule. Season 6 consists of a flashback to a period 15 years earlier, showing how Arthur came to power in Britain as a representative of the Roman Empire but also as the chosen of the gods, the only man who can wield Excalibur. We also see how he ended up with such an odd group of "knights" and with a wife with whom he cannot be intimate.

The final episode of Season 6 brings us back to the Season 5 cliffhanger with Arthur still alive but very ill. Lancelot, given power by Arthur based on the latter's enduring trust in him, ravages the island and destroys the Round Table, both physically and spiritually. The final words of the episode, projected over a recovering Arthur, leading up to the projected movie trilogy, are "Soon Arthur will once again be a hero".

Casting

  • Alexandre Astier: Arthur
    King Arthur
    King Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and...

    , King of Britain
    Roman Britain
    Roman Britain was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire from AD 43 until ca. AD 410.The Romans referred to the imperial province as Britannia, which eventually comprised all of the island of Great Britain south of the fluid frontier with Caledonia...

  • Lionnel Astier: Léodagan
    Leodegrance
    King Leodegrance is the father of Queen Guinevere in Arthurian legend. His kingdom of Carmelide is sometimes identified with a location somewhere in the southwest of England, but may be located in Breton Cornouaille near the town of Carhaix, which is the Carhaise of L'Histoire de Merlin King...

      King of Cameliard
  • Simon Astier: Yvain
    Ywain
    Sir Ywain is a Knight of the Round Table and the son of King Urien in Arthurian legend...

    , Knight of the Lion
    Yvain, the Knight of the Lion
    Yvain, the Knight with the Lion is a romance by Chrétien de Troyes. It was probably written in the 1170s simultaneously with Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart, and includes several references to the action in that poem...

    , Guenièvre's brother
  • Guillaume Briat: king of the Burgundians
    Burgundians
    The Burgundians were an East Germanic tribe which may have emigrated from mainland Scandinavia to the island of Bornholm, whose old form in Old Norse still was Burgundarholmr , and from there to mainland Europe...

  • Carlo Brandt: Méléagant
    Maleagant
    Maleagant is a villain from Arthurian legend. In a number of versions of a popular episode, Maleagant abducts Guinevere, necessitating her rescue by King Arthur and his knights. The earliest surviving version of this episode names the abductor Melwas...

    , the man in black
  • Christian Bujeau: Master of Arms
  • Antoine de Caunes
    Antoine de Caunes
    Antoine de Caunes is a television presenter, actor, writer and film director. He is the son of two prominent French personalities, television journalist-reporter Georges de Caunes and television announcer Jacqueline Joubert...

    : Dagonet
    Dagonet
    Sir Dagonet was King Arthur's well-beloved jester, and a Knight of the Round Table of Arthurian legend. He saw himself as a courageous warrior and would present himself as such. Yet, in reality, he would flee at the slightest provocation...

    , knight
  • Jacques Chambon: Merlin
    Merlin
    Merlin is a legendary figure best known as the wizard featured in the Arthurian legend. The standard depiction of the character first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, written c. 1136, and is based on an amalgamation of previous historical and legendary figures...

    , wizard
  • Luc Chambon: Nathair, spy
  • Alain Chapuis: the innkeeper
  • Thomas Cousseau: Lancelot
    Lancelot
    Sir Lancelot du Lac is one of the Knights of the Round Table in the Arthurian legend. He is the most trusted of King Arthur's knights and plays a part in many of Arthur's victories...

     of the Lake, knight
  • Julien Dutel: Kay
    Sir Kay
    In Arthurian legend, Sir Kay is Sir Ector's son and King Arthur's foster brother and later seneschal, as well as one of the first Knights of the Round Table. In later literature he is known for his acid tongue and bullying, boorish behavior, but in earlier accounts he was one of Arthur's premier...

    , horn blower
  • Josée Drevon: Ygerne
    Igraine
    Igraine , in Arthurian legend, is the mother of King Arthur. She is also known in Latin as Igerna, in Welsh as Eigyr, in French as Igerne, in Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur as Ygrayne— often modernized as Igraine—and in Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival as Arnive...

     of Tintagel
    Tintagel
    Tintagel is a civil parish and village situated on the Atlantic coast of Cornwall, United Kingdom. The population of the parish is 1,820 people, and the area of the parish is ....

    , Arthur's mother
  • Caroline Ferrus: Mevanwi, Karadoc's wife
  • Audrey Fleurot: the Lady of the Lake
    Lady of the Lake
    The Lady of the Lake is the name of several related characters who play parts in the Arthurian legend. These characters' roles include giving King Arthur his sword Excalibur, enchanting Merlin, and raising Lancelot after the death of his father...

     (she played Angharad in the pilot episodes)
  • Bruno Fontaine: Elias of Kelliwic'h
    Celliwig
    Celliwig, Kelliwic or Gelliwic, is perhaps the earliest named location for the court of King Arthur. It may be translated as 'forest grove'.-Literary references:...

    , wizard
  • Brice Fournier: Kadoc, Karadoc's brother
  • Nicolas Gabion: Bohort
    Bors
    Bors circa 540s-580s, is the name of two knights in the Arthurian legend, one the father and one the son. Bors the Elder is the King of Gaunnes or Gaul during the early period of King Arthur's reign, and is the brother of King Ban of Benoic. Gaunnes is the Fredemundian dynastic kingdom of Neustria...

    , King of Gaunnes
  • Anne Girouard: Guenièvre
    Guinevere
    Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot...

    , Arthur's wife
  • Gilles Graveleau: Roparzh, peasant
  • Vanessa Guedj: Angharad, Guinevere's maid (she played Guinevere herself in the pilot episodes)
  • Jean-Christophe Hembert : Karadoc
    Caradoc
    Caradoc Vreichvras Arm) was a semi-legendary ancestor to the kings of Gwent. He lived during the 5th or 6th century. He is remembered in Arthurian legend as a Knight of the Round Table as Carados Briefbras ....

    , Knight of Vannes
    Vannes
    Vannes is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2000 years ago.-Geography:Vannes is located on the Gulf of Morbihan at the mouth of two rivers, the Marle and the Vincin. It is around 100 km northwest of Nantes and 450 km south west...

  • Alexis Hénon: Galessin, Duke of Orkney
  • Valérie Keruzoré: Nessa, maid
  • Alban Lenoir: Ferghus, Lancelot's aide-de-camp
  • Jean-Robert Lombard: Father Blaise, priest of Kaamelott
  • Stéphane Margot: Calogrenant
    Calogrenant
    Sir Calogrenant, sometimes known in English as Colgrevance, or, in ancient Welsh, Cynan ap Clydno, is a Knight of the Round Table in Arthurian legend. He is a cousin to Sir Ywain, and his courtesy and eloquence were known throughout the kingdom....

    , King of Caledonia
    Caledonia
    Caledonia is the Latinised form and name given by the Romans to the land in today's Scotland north of their province of Britannia, beyond the frontier of their empire...

  • Serge Papagalli: Guethenoc, peasant
  • Caroline Pascal: Demetra, Arthur's mistress
  • Franck Pitiot: Perceval
    Percival
    Percival or Perceval is one of King Arthur's legendary Knights of the Round Table. In Welsh literature his story is allotted to the historical Peredur...

    , Knight of Wales
    Wales
    Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

  • Aurélien Portehaut: Gauvain
    Gawain
    Gawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table who appears very early in the Arthurian legend's development. He is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as the greatest knight, most notably in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight...

    , knight, Arthur's nephew
  • François Rollin: Loth
    King Lot
    Lot or Loth is the eponymous king of Lothian in the Arthurian legend. He is best known as the father of Sir Gawain. Such a ruler evidently first appeared in hagiographical material concerning Saint Kentigern , which feature a Leudonus, king of Leudonia, a Latin name for Lothian...

    , King of Orkney
  • Thibault Roux: Grüdü, bodyguard
    Bodyguard
    A bodyguard is a type of security operative or government agent who protects a person—usually a famous, wealthy, or politically important figure—from assault, kidnapping, assassination, stalking, loss of confidential information, terrorist attack or other threats.Most important public figures such...

     of the King
  • Alexandra Saadoun: Tumet, Arthur's mistress
  • Magali Saadoun: Aziliz, Arthur's mistress
  • Tony Saba: Hervé of Rinel, knight
  • Bruno Salomone: Caius Camillus, Roman centurion
    Centurion (Roman army)
    A centurion , also hekatontarch in Greek sources, or, in Byzantine times, kentarch was a professional officer of the Roman army after the Marian reforms of 107 BC...

  • Joëlle Sevilla: Séli, Léodagan's wife, Guenièvre's mother
  • Anne-Valérie Soler: Aelis, Arthur's mistress
  • Loïc Varraut: Venec, slave trader


Many of them are friends or family of Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier is a French writer, director, editor and actor.He is most known as the writer, editor, director and lead actor of the French television series Kaamelott, in which he also plays King Arthur....

, and have already worked with him. Family members include his father Lionnel, his half-brother Simon, his mother Joëlle Sevilla, and Simon's mother Josée Drevon. They, and many of the actors in the series, are part of the theater scene in the south of France. The few persons coming from a casting session are Anne Girouard (Guenièvre
Guinevere
Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot...

), Vanessa Guedj (Angharad) and Guillaume Briat (King of the Burgundians).

Guest stars

Various guest stars have made appearances on the show, including Guy Bedos
Guy Bedos
Guy Bedos is an actor and stand-up comedian, mostly known in France for his part in the film Nous irons tous au paradis....

, Didier Bénureau, Emma de Caunes
Emma de Caunes
Emma de Caunes is a French film actress. She is best known for playing the role of Sabine in Mr. Bean's Holiday.- Life and career :...

, Bruno Salomone, Alain Chabat
Alain Chabat
Alain Chabat is a French actor and director who appeared in La Cité de la peur, French Twist, The Taste of Others and The Science of Sleep.- Life and career :Chabat was born in Oran, French Algeria. He is Jewish....

, Christian Clavier
Christian Clavier
Christian Clavier is a French actor. He is the brother of French film director Stéphane Clavier.-Biography:After his high class studies at the Neuilly Lycée Pasteur—though asserted here and there, he never studied at Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris —he started his acting career with the...

, Émilie Dequenne
Émilie Dequenne
Émilie Dequenne is a French-speaking Belgian actress.-Biography:She won the Best Actress award at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival for her debut film performance in the Palme d'Or-winning film Rosetta...

, Léa Drucker
Léa Drucker
Léa Drucker is a French actress, born 23 January 1972 in Caen, Normandy.thumb|right|180px| Léa Drucker in 2006She is the niece of the television presenter Michel Drucker, and of the ex-president of the M6 television chain, Jean Drucker. Her father Jacques is a medical doctor, and her mother,...

, François Morel
François Morel
François Morel is a Canadian composer, pianist, conductor, and music education. An associate of the Canadian Music Centre, he was made a Knight of the National Order of Quebec in 1994 and was awarded the Prix Denise-Pelletier in 1996...

, Claire Nadeau, Philippe Nahon
Philippe Nahon
-Biography:Nahon is best known for his roles in French horror and thriller films, including I Stand Alone, Humains, Calvaire, Irréversible, The Pack and Haute Tension, and he has been featured as a nameless butcher in three films by Gaspar Noé – Carne, I Stand Alone, and Irréversible .-Filmography...

, Barbara Schulz
Barbara Schulz
Barbara Schulz is a French actress who won the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti in 2001. She was nominated for the César Award for Most Promising Actress for the 1999 film La Dilettante....

, Georges Beller and Élie Semoun. Season 6 guest stars include Pierre Mondy, Tcheky Karyo
Tchéky Karyo
-Early life:Karyo was born in Istanbul to a Greek mother and Sephardic-Jewish father and raised in Paris, France. He studied drama at the Cyrano Theatre and later became a member of the Daniel Sorano Company, playing many classical roles.-Career:...

, Emmanuel Meirieu, Manu Payet, Marthe Villalonga
Marthe Villalonga
Marthe Villalonga , is a French actress. She has appeared in 93 films between 1963 and 2008.She was born in Fort-de-l'Eau, Algeria.-External links:...

, Jacky Berroyer, Fréderic Forestier, Valeria Cavalli, Marion Creuxvaux, and many others.

French editions

Livres 1-3 were issued in two single-disc “tomes” to be purchased individually (each containing 50 episodes).

The 6 Livres have each been issued in a complete ("intégrale") “collector’s edition” (3 discs each for Livres 1-4, 4 discs each for Livres 5-6) with bonus material including blooper reels (aka "bêtisier"), pilots, documentaries, previews of next season. This edition has a “bound-book” look (in the style of the Lord of the Rings collectors’ editions) and interior illustrations which include artwork by Jérome Jouvray.

The bonus materials ("Addendum") in the collector's sets include: Livre 1, Dies irae and the pilots, bêtisier (i.e. blooper reel); Livre 2, documentary "Aux Sources de Kaamelott: Les Moeurs et les Femmes," bêtisier, teasers for Livres 1-3; Livre 3, documentary "Aux Sources de Kaamelott: La Magie et l'Eglise," bêtisier, trailer for Livre 4 and for the first comic book; Livre 4, documentary "Aux Sources de Kaamelott: L'Art de la Guerre," bêtisier, trailer for Livre 5 and for the second comic book; Livre 5, interview with Alexandre Astier (wandering around the Cinecitta Rome set), documentary "Aux Sources de Kaamelott: La Géopolitique du Royaume," bêtisier, trailer for Livre 6; Livre 6, documentary "Aux Sources de Kaamelott: Les Chevaliers de la Table Ronde," Making Of documentary, bêtisier

Livres 5 and 6 were released as a 3-disc Blu-Ray set, at the same time as the regular (4-disc) DVD set. Since the entire series has been shot in HD, Blu-Ray issues of previous Livres are possible.

All the collectors' editions have French subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing as an option for Kaamelott itself. Livres 4, 5, and 6 also have English subtitles. None of the Addendum films have subtitles.

Other editions

A Canadian (Region 1) edition of Livres 1 and 2 (similar to the French Collector's edition) has been released in 2009 by Alliance Vivafilm. The edition is in French (menus, episode titles, etc.) but the episodes have English subtitles. The Addendum episodes (Dies Irae, pilots) do not have subtitles. The artwork inside the case is different from the French edition.

Spin-off

Alexandre Astier has begun publishing the scripts for the series with Éditions Télémaque:
  • Kaamelott Livre I Texte Intégral : Episodes 1 à 100 (2009). Includes some episodes that were not filmed.
  • Kaamelott Livre II Texte Intégral : Episodes 1 à 100 (2009)


Five comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...

s inspired by Kaamelott have been published, from November 2006 to November 2010, with stories by Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier
Alexandre Astier is a French writer, director, editor and actor.He is most known as the writer, editor, director and lead actor of the French television series Kaamelott, in which he also plays King Arthur....

and art by Steven Dupré. They can be read in any order:
  • L'Armée du Nécromant (The Necromancer's Army)
  • Les Sièges de Transport (The Transporter Seats)
  • L'Enigme du Coffre (The Mystery of the Strongbox)
  • Perceval et le Dragon d'Airain (Perceval and the Dragon of Airain)
  • Le Serpent Géant du Lac de l'Ombre (The Giant Snake of the Shadow Lake)

Eric Le Nabour and Martin Aurell have published two books which discuss the series in terms of medieval history and Arthurian legends.
  • Kaamelott: Au coeur du moyen âge. Perrin, 2007. (ISBN 978-2-262-02630-1).
  • Kaamelott: A la table du roi Arthur. Perrin, 2007 (ISBN 978-2262027094).


4 tie-in items (Arthur's Oghma amulet, a mug, a notebook, and a 2009 calendar) were premiums with the purchase of a "Menu Top" at the Quick hamburger chain in late 2008 and early 2009.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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