When was he really born?
The civil registry announces this last day of May 1940, when France in disarray opens five shameful years.
But is it not rather at 17, when he throws himself between his mother and the car whose hand brake his brother Jean-François has unwisely released?
Two years of enforced immobility followed, during which he read more than a thousand books, jumping from Marcel Proust - which he would not really understand until later - to Jules Michelet, from Jean Giraudoux to Somerset Maugham and, trees in the shade from which he grew up, from Alexis de Tocqueville to Raymond Aron.
Or was he born on September 4, 1958, the day he went in a 2-CV to attend General de Gaulle's speech presenting the new Constitution he had concocted for the country?
Arrived very early on Place de la République, in Paris, he sits in the front row and drinks the words of the great man.
When he returned home, he gave up studying history to embrace political journalism.
His parents, whom he had, from the age of 13, convinced to double their daily reading of Figaro by that of Le Monde, for the sake of pluralism, tick a little, but an internship obtained in the prestigious evening daily, just after Sciences Po, reassures them.
The year 1968, which precipitated his training by plunging him into the political bath, did not change him.
Conservative, he knew he was;
conservative, he asserts himself.
"Clairvoyant but not very imaginative", as Pierre Mendès France told him, for whom he had immense admiration.
Blue sweater, scarf and stripe on the side
In May 2020, he attacked his ninth decade.
Health concerns this summer do not seem to have affected him.
The sweater is blue.
The pants, gray.
The socks, red.
His usual scarf is not there, replaced by a hand he often places on his throat, and the stainless parting on the side, the age of which does not modify either the thickness or the outline, still bars his skull.
In his office, books laid flat take up the entire table.
There are a few works there written in the form of memoirs, whether political (those of Jean-Pierre Chevènement or Jean-Noël Jeanneney), historical (those of General Gouraud, who distinguished himself in Africa at the beginning of the 20th century. ), or literary (including “the Pigeon Tunnel”, by John Le Carré, or the magnificent “Archives du Nord”, by Marguerite Yourcenar).
On the wall, Venetian masks and, on the fireplace, figurines of the Grand Army offered to him by his wife every time he leaves one of his books.
"He has a lot of information, and he never gives them all"
He had said 10 o'clock.
You shouldn't be late, all her friends had warned me.
I haven't been.
You had to leave on time (I had asked for one): I was less rigorous, "scratching" for ten more minutes.
He remained perfectly courteous, just pointing out that we had "already said a lot".
Courtesy of which it is customary.
“When I arrived at RTL, remembers journalist Jean-Michel Aphatie, I had a coffee with him and the director of the radio.
He was immediately charming, welcoming, without any concern for rivalry.
Looking at him, I quickly understood one of his essential rules: he has a lot of info, and he never gives them all.
He is not the man of the scoop, but the man of fair and informed analysis.
A bit of a broken mold, I'm afraid.
"
This cordiality, everyone puts it forward.
"I've never seen him tripping over anyone," says Michèle Cotta, former director general of France 2. "It's a forty-three-year friendship that doesn't fade away in personal crises" , slips his accomplice Jean-Pierre Elkabbach.
Her editor, Muriel Beyer, remembers her reaction when she decided to found her own house, Les Editions de l'Observatoire, and to take it with her.
"He didn't ask me anything, he just said:
You will give me the new address
.
"" He has enough certainties about what he is worth not to lock himself in a haughty distance, and on the contrary he ages in benevolence ", affirms the chronicler Catherine Nay.
Newsletter - Most of the news
Every morning, the news seen by Le Parisien
I'm registering
Your email address is collected by Le Parisien to enable you to receive our news and commercial offers.
Learn more
This benevolence also extends to himself.
“His main fault, concedes Michèle Cotta, is never to question himself.
"Claude Askolovitch, journalist who debated with him on RTL in the program" On remake the world ", assures:" I often took slaps while listening to him.
But he ceased to be amiable when his precedence was not recognized.
He opened or closed the show, and quickly made us feel, in case of disagreement, that we were kids.
His thought seemed to me very constructed, but padlocked.
"" It is not very manageable, concedes Nathalie Saint-Cricq, head of the political service of France 2 and also companion of Patrice Duhamel, Alain's brother.
But never in bad faith.
"
There was no television at the Duhamels'
After his beginnings in the written press in Le Monde, where Jacques Fauvet introduced him and made him grow, then in 1992 at Liberation, at the Latest News in Alsace and at Le Point, he discovered the audiovisual industry.
Quickly, we see it and we hear it everywhere.
Developing your career in TV shows means leafing through Télé 7 jours: "Equal Arms" (from 1970 to 1973), "Les Trois Vérités" (from 1973 to 1974), "Cartes sur table" (from 1977 to 1981), "Crosswords" (from 1997 to 2001), "Open question" (from 2001 to 2006), and "100 minutes to convince" (from 2002 to 2005).
Not to mention regular appearances in the “Grand Journal”, in “L'Heure de Truth” or “C dans l'air”, and today on BFMTV.
On the radio, he was heard on France Culture and the morning of Europe 1 (from 1974 to 1999), and on RTL (from 1999).
During this time, his brother Patrice will take over the management of France Television.
When they were children, there was no television at the Duhamels', and they had to ask permission to go see it at the butcher's, blessed owner of a black and white set.
Alain Duhamel (left) questions Nicolas Sarkozy, with Jean-Pierre Elkabbach (right), during the “Press Club” of Europe 1, in 1993./LP/Jean-Marc Navarro
His consecration came in 1974, with the televised debate of the second round of the presidential election - the first of its kind - opposing Valéry Giscard d'Estaing to François Mitterrand.
He will also co-present the one - too courteous - of 1995, between Jacques Chirac and Lionel Jospin, and will be in several presidential interviews.
His round face, his smooth prelate speech, the mischievousness of his gaze and his hairstyle, disdainful of all excess, become familiar.
Like his unconditional support for Europe, his obvious taste for the center and the moderates, or his concern for clarity.
“He also has a formidable gift for improvisation,” says Jean-Pierre Elkabbach.
On the day of the attack on a synagogue on rue Copernic in Paris in 1980, he was not working.
I called him.
He came on his Solex and spoke without notes for twelve minutes, just to calm things down. "" During the debates, he is the best ", also assures Catherine Nay.
The good and the bad with Elkabbach
Of this series with multiple seasons, the show “Cartes sur table” remains his favorite episode.
From 1977 to 1981, introduced by the credits "Way of the Pilgrim" by John Mc Laughlin, he cooks a guest with Jean-Pierre Elkabbach.
Extravagant duo, the union of two temperaments, two physique, two ambitions.
One brown, the other blond.
One aggressive and kicks in, the other masters and setting discreet traps.
"He was the good one, I was the bad one, and the guest was the ugly", sums up laughing Jean-Pierre Elkabbach, who will aspire to all powers when Alain Duhamel refuses to lead France 2 and Europe 1.
This omnipresence does not please everyone.
He becomes the favorite target of the association of media critic Acrimed and Serge Halimi, who traps him in his vanity in a sequence of the film "The New Guard Dogs".
For many, he embodies "reverent journalism", which does not however prevent him from being suspended three times: in 1981, when the great socialist cleansing of the audiovisual sector made him take a few months off;
in 2002, for having co-authored a book with Lionel Jospin, then Prime Minister;
and in 2007, after having recklessly confided to Sciences Po students that he would vote for François Bayrou.
“Each time, he felt betrayed, and he felt an injustice,” says Michèle Cotta.
The politicians appreciate it, even if it irritates them from time to time.
In his book “Le Temps des tempêtes” (2020), Nicolas Sarkozy boasts “a more original personality than we think.
I liked being questioned by him, precisely because it was more difficult and complex than with his colleagues ”.
François Hollande is having fun having started in politics while Alain Duhamel was already speaking.
“As a teenager, I read his articles.
The journalist of the time, full of confidence and science, today almost has the aura of an old sage.
He participates in the debate.
It gives it depth.
He was accused of connivance: I don't think so.
He respects power and institutions, but knows the price of his freedom.
"
With Lionel Jospin, he played tennis
Its durability is due to a capacity for work and a rigorous organization close to mania, arousing both irony and admiration among those close to him.
Every morning he is up at 6 a.m.
Every day, he reads for six hours (three hours of newspapers, three hours of books).
Every evening, he puts his guests outside, when he has them, at 10:30 p.m. at the latest.
“One day when Michel Poniatowski, then Minister of the Interior, arrived at 10:15 pm, he left immediately!
Remembers Michèle Cotta.
For sixty years, Alain Duhamel's continuity has been due to a capacity for work and a rigor that sometimes borders on mania.
And to a look recognizable among all (here, in 1983) ./ Francis Apesteguy / Getty
What to stick to the Protestant spirit he chose, he who was born Catholic?
Without a doubt.
"I like the freedom of conscience," he says.
Does this freedom allow friendship with politicians?
“Yes, but a friendship limited by public rules,” adds Alain Duhamel.
“At the start, he gave in to the cute sin of admiration for Valéry Giscard d'Estaing,” recalls Catherine Nay.
During his two seven-year terms, François Mitterrand invited them, him and Jean-Pierre Elkabbach, for trips to the restaurant where they confronted their points of view by gulping down ortolans.
With Lionel Jospin, he played tennis.
"Tennis is important to him," smiles François Hollande.
He who is apparently calm shows his desire to win there.
"
But we must not betray his friendship!
He broke with Dominique Strauss-Kahn after the Sofitel affair ("He wasted a chance for France") and expressed a very clear disgust for the dishonesty of Jérôme Cahuzac or Patrick Balkany.
Modesty never faulted
His family life suffered from this political passion.
“It was not the uncle who took you to the square, remembers his nephew Benjamin, political journalist at BFMTV and the last audiovisual bud of the family tree.
But he was careful.
When he was offered to come to BFM, he first asked if that wouldn't put me in a difficult situation.
Nathalie Saint-Cricq, Benjamin's mother and Patrice's companion, both sister-in-law and colleague, also finds him "very attentive in the family.
He followed Benjamin a lot, taking him on family rides in his car to chat with him.
He is very tender with his grandchildren.
But he prefers when they are older.
The infant is not his thing ”.
In this austere existence, however, a grain of madness shines, his wife, France, musician, conductor, by his side for fifty-three years.
“I met him at a lunch with my sister.
I had found him very sympathetic, but I also felt that he did not take himself for nothing.
Yet I said to my sister:
He is the kind of man I could marry
.
"Prophecy verified: they married in 1967." My father told me:
You will have to be the king's fool
.
She was, introducing into his life a wind of fantasy which he himself praises for its wholesomeness.
Example among many others: to one day direct Jacques Offenbach's opera-bouffe "La Belle Hélène", she goes to the pulpit, dressed in a Greek costume, eliciting laughter from the crowd.
Alain was not warned, "which had avoided him trying to dissuade me," she laughs.
“I really discovered his seriousness after our marriage.
Serious, but not sad.
We laugh a lot.
He was a good father, without being overwhelming.
Work came first.
The use of the home telephone was reserved for him as a priority.
"
His wife, France, musician and conductor, describes Alain Duhamel as a “serious man, but not sad” ./Francis Apesteguy / Getty
Regarding the sharing of tasks, it is more from the beginning of the Fifth Republic than today.
“Until, not long ago, France broke a foot, I don't think he knew where the dishwasher was,” laughs Catherine Nay.
And some attribute to an unconscious misogyny his lack of clairvoyance towards Ségolène Royal, which he did not rank in 2007 among the possible candidates for the Elysee, an error that he readily concedes today, as he recognizes his lack of lucidity in the face of to the rise of the far right.
His tweets are written by others at BFM, and he still writes his books by hand, in a small handwriting so tight it evokes an army of ants.
Will he die on stage, like Molière of political journalism?
The question will not shake a modesty that has never been found wanting.
At the very most, he will admit, by evoking his disappearance, to wish for his arrival “in not too long” and above all to want it “honorable”.
His tomb has already been dug in a small Cévennes village, in the middle of the camisarde soil.
In paradise (it is difficult to see that his peaceful existence leads him to hellish flames), he will perhaps arbitrate a debate between Martin Luther and Jean Calvin, which he will both listen to without bias, but with a preference.
Cards on tables, gentlemen!