Journalist, host and humorist Patrick Nordmann has died, RTS learned on Saturday. Hired by Radio Télévision Suisse at the end of the 1970s, he was notably the father of the “Dicodeurs”, participated in the “Fond de la corbeille”, wrote two scripts for the comic strip Lucky Luke and co-founded the satirical weekly Vigousse. .
Patrick Nordmann marked the history of radio with programs like “At the bottom on the left” or “Cinq sur cinq”. A radio of humor, uninhibited. We have known him willingly mocking, corrosive, passing the news in the mill alongside Lova Golovtchiner in The bottom of the basket, daring to criticize the small and the big failings of his time.
His father Roger Nordmann, also a journalist, reinvented modern radio for some. Emissions have survived him, such as the Chaîne du bonheur. A worthy descendant of his father, he was “a multi-faceted character”, testified on Saturday evening on the Forum program another radio man, his colleague and friend Jean-François Moulin.
>> Listen to Jean-François Moulin’s tribute to Patrick Nordmann in Forum:
Son of an intellectual but very earthy, he loved horses, the world of westerns, and always said: “I am both the Indian and the cowboy”. In the year 2000, he also wrote the screenplay for the comic strip “The Prophet”, the 110th story in Morris’ Lucky Luke series. He did it once more two years later with the scenario of “The legend of the west”.
“He liked to scrap with the world”
“He was a character who liked to scrap with the world, with what he did not like. He loved peace, everything that was happy”, says Jean-François Moulin, who also paints the portrait of a man who hated injustice and might dig a long time for his investigations.
He remembers in particular his laughter, which emerged clearly even within an audience. “I have never laughed as much as with Patrick Nordmann. He had a very special sense of humor, liked to make fun of himself. And he did it with such happiness that it was truly a delight to spend evenings with him. !”
As recently as this summer, on July 12, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Radio Suisse Romande, Patrick Nordmann was the guest of the program “Les Bonnes ondes” alongside his sidekick Jean-Charles Simon. The opportunity to evoke with nostalgia and self-mockery their lives on the radio.
>> Listen to the show:
Bottle-fed with chained duck
At the end of his career, he co-founded the weekly Vigousse with Thierry Barrigue, then an investigative journalism agency. “We don’t like injustices. We don’t like powers, whether political, economic or judicial, to arrogate powers that are outside the rules they should follow,” he said. RTS shortly following the founding of the satirical newspaper.
“Patrick Nordmann was immersed in Le Canard enchaîné. It was his bible. You might feel it when he was doing the subtitles for Vigousse. That’s probably what gave him this verve, this writing talent” , explains Jean-François Moulin, who also recalls another of his talents, less known, his role as lyricist for Pascal Auberson.
Forum/Vincent Cherpillod