Maman A Tort - Background and Writing

Background and Writing

In December 1983, Jerôme Dahan and Laurent Boutonnat, two friends, composed a song called "Maman a tort", about lesbian love between a girl committed to a mental hospital and her nurse. To find a performer, they held a casting. A girl aged 15–16 was initially chosen to perform the song, before being rejected because she was too young to sing its sexually ambiguous lyrics. Boutonnat then decided to ask one of his friends, Mylène Gautier, to sing the track. Both composers have said that they thought Gautier seemed psychotic and thus was the ideal person to record the track. Boutonnat said: "As soon as I saw her, with her triangular face, I realized that this would be her and nobody else. She looked crazy, it was perfect." After they decided to work with her, Gautier took the pseudonym of Farmer, as a tribute to actress Frances Farmer.

According to Jean-Claude Déquéant, Farmer showed limited enthusiasm during the demo recordings and declared: "The voice was surprisingly present and she laughed after each take when listening". Dahan was satisfied, because Farmer had a clear and deep voice and could easily reach high notes. Initial rehearsals were held at Dahan's home. Dahan has said of these rehearsals: "There was a large room with a piano and there we repeated the staging of the song. Mylène had a hard time understanding all this, we had to teach her everything, starting with the choreography This probably did not look very professional."

Recording of the French version of "Maman a tort" took place in Paris in January 1984, with Farmer stating that the sessions were a "magic" moment. Later, the English language version of the song was recorded in an afternoon at the Dany Darras studio in Cernay. Farmer had no difficulty in singing in English because she spoke the language very well, having lived in Canada.

Initially Boutonnat and Dahan found it difficult to find a record company who would release the track, either because labels were worried about the song being censored due to the sexual nature of its lyrics or because they did not see any commercial potential in the track. In order to get a second appointment with RCA records the pair claimed they had remixed the song, even though they had not. Only after a third appointment with RCA did the label's Francis Dacla give them a contract.

According to France Dimanche, the song saved the singer from entering into a loveless marriage. Farmer had become disillusioned with showbusiness after struggling to get even tiny roles in commercials and had resolved to wed a childhood friend, a student of the École nationale d'administration, before she was selected to sing "Maman a tort".