Did Emily ruin Paris?

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1:11Hey Asma. Hey Tristan. I'm talking to you from Paris where I live and we are smack bang in the middle right now of Emily in Paris time. It's a period of the year, Asma, for those who celebrate, which begins in the spring and it lasts until the end of the summer, maybe in September. And it's the time of the year when hordes of tourists, many of them American, descend on Paris and they come to visit the home of the TV series Emily in Paris. I know you are a fan and they're often drinking wine on the train and then they fan out into the city and they go to the Emily spots but they also often take over some places in town like there'll be like a boulangerie which they go and take pictures of themselves outside of and some Parisians are a bit tired of the situation and that is what our episode is going to be about today because some Parisians are asking themselves if Emily has ruined Paris or maybe just some spots of Paris.

2:21I've watched every episode of Emily in Paris. I'm not going to say it is the most advanced, sophisticated TV viewing, but I would say that, you know, Tristan, a lot of people would look at a show like Emily in Paris and look at what you're describing that happens in Paris over the summer and think, OK, loads of tourist dollars are coming into your city. What's the problem? Even the president of France, Emmanuel Macron, has said that this show is good for the image of France, that he sees it as super positive in terms of attractiveness for the country. Well, that's what we're going to delve into today on The Global Story.

3:01So let's do the official business. From the BBC, I'm Tristan Redman in Paris. And I'm Asma Khaled in Washington, D.C. Today on The Global Story, do shows like Emily in Paris do more harm than good to the cities they're set in? Or does Tristan just need to get over himself?

3:23I feel like I need to be straight up here. Tristan, I have been watching Emily in Paris since the first season came out in 2020. We were in the midst of the pandemic and it was just some good, harmless TV fun. There was a lot going on in the world. We could not travel, and Emily in Paris took us somewhere. Bonjour. Bonjour. I'm Emily. You're a new neighbor? Enchanté. You've come to teach the French some American tricks? This is a show that came out in the fall of 2020 on Netflix, and it chronicles the adventures of this young Midwestern woman, a woman from Chicago. I, too, am a somewhat young woman from the Midwest, and it shows her earnestness as she is.

4:07I like how you laugh that I'm a young Midwesterner. And the show chronicles her adventures in Paris as she's this young marketing executive trying to find her way. Paris is the most exciting city in the world. You never know what's going to happen next. It is a caricature of an overly eager Midwesterner, which I, too, can relate with. There are scenes from the beginning of the show where Emily meets her new best friend in Paris. And one of the first questions she asks is if she's from Indiana. They had you at the mention of Indiana, Asma, didn't they? Netflix said that the first season was seen in 58 million households.

4:49It was the most popular comedy show of that year. It was quickly renewed. They're currently filming the sixth season. The final season, according to Netflix, will be out at the end of this year. And the show has changed the city of Paris a lot since it first launched six years ago. And we're going to get into that today. Tristan, you say that the show has changed the city of Paris with the influx of tourists it's brought in. But can you quantify that for us? I mean, how much tourism has it substantively brought to Paris? Well, that's a good question. It depends who you listen to. I'm going to give you the two opposing camps on this.

5:25So Ted Sarandos, who's the head of Netflix, claimed in 2025 that 39 % of tourists to France came because of Emily in Paris. And something like that figure has actually also been picked up by Emmanuel Macron. But there was actually a study done on this. So one in 10 tourists to France say, according to this study by Ipsos, which is a polling agency, one in 10 people who come to France say they came because they saw a TV show or a film. And of those one in 10, 38 % cited Emily in Paris as the show that motivated them to come to France. So on balance, that's like almost 4 % of the people surveyed.

6:15So it's not a huge amount. So a much smaller fraction, yeah. Yeah. How popular is tourism writ large in Paris in the summer months? I mean, do we have any sense of how much money it also brings into the economy? So the French government figures are just over 100 million people visit France every year. And that amount is increasing every year as well. Around a quarter of those, according to the French government, visit the capital city. And that puts it in the top handful of most visited cities in the world. We can't quantify exactly what the boost from Emily on its own would be. The head of Netflix, he says his company invests$250 million annually into the French cinema and TV industry.

7:01So let's talk a little bit more about the show itself, Emily in Paris. Tell us who's behind the show and why they wanted to make a show like this. Well, the supremo of Emily in Paris, the writer, is a man called Darren Starr, who's famous for making a string of hits. He made Beverly Hills 90210. He made Melrose Place. He made famously, famously Sex in the City. And Emily in Paris is his latest show. Now, he says that he first became interested in France when he was at college. He's told the New York Times, I know how French people look at me when they look at Americans. I can see some of their prejudices.

7:40I can see some of my prejudices. And this plays into this whole idea that the show itself is, you know, full of stereotypes and cliches about who French people are and who Americans are. So he has really leant into all of this. Emmanuel Macron, in fact, awarded him the Légion d 'Honneur, which is, you know, something akin to a presidential medal of honor in the United States or the Medal of Freedom. Macron said to Darren Starr at the time, he said, you make France shine across the world.

8:17When this show came out in 2020, let's just say the reviews were divided, largely depending on where you were. So the Hollywood Reporter called it strikingly watchable. In France, it was a different picture. The film mag Premier said, The French are all mean and all lazy and never arrive at the office before late morning. They're incorrigible flirts with no concept of being faithful. The entertainment website Sense Critique called the show, quote, science fiction, and said that it was so full of cliches that the writers probably considered sticking, quote, a baguette under each Frenchman or even a beret on their heads.

9:08An asthma. To that effect, I have some props for you today. My beret. Yeah, here's my beret.

9:19Okay, so from a French perspective, the big problems with the show are the shamelessness of the stereotypes of French people. So they're portrayed as rude, chain-smoking, heavy-drinking, work-shy, womanizing, lecherous, sexist, unfaithful, and unwashed. Paris is this place where every man that Emily meets is basically a kind of six-foot-four male model. The city looks like a museum. I mean, it looks stunning. Paris is stunning, but it's also, you know, it's a real place where— I don't understand, Tristan, aren't some of these clichés good? You're saying Paris looks stunning. I would love for folks to come in and be like, Washington DC looks stunning and portray all our people as beautiful.

10:05I think Parisians are quite sensitive to the idea of their city being fetishized and not just by outsiders. So I remember a few years ago, there was a candidate for the mayor of Paris and she did an interview in which she said that she found the metro romantic. And her candidacy basically died and sank without a trace after that point because Parisians thought it was so ridiculous that she said that the metro was romantic. I mean, the metro is quite smelly, it's very hot, and it's quite dirty. So people are like, have you ever been on the metro? And that was the end of her candidacy, and I haven't really seen her politically ever since.

10:40So the idea of fetishizing the city, it's like we can do it, but we don't necessarily like it when other people do it very much. Though it does depict some really beautiful aspects of Paris. I would say it depicts this beautiful city with amazing food and a sense that Emily, who's a workaholic, ought to just chill out and enjoy life more as they depict the Parisians do. Well, Asma, I went to the belly of the beast. I went to the fifth arrondissement, which is the Latin Quarter, which is where Emily in Paris is mostly filmed. And I had something of an unexpected and very lucky scoop. I stumbled across them filming.

11:18There was like, you know, there was rubbernecking Parisians and rubbernecking tourists. Some of them were visitors who'd arrived from all over the world who couldn't believe their luck that they just stumbled across this shoot. And I got a spectrum of opinion from them. Where are you from? I'm from Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada. What has the show told you about Paris that made you really want to come here? I like the diversity, the culture, the history. I've enjoyed watching her mishaps, being an American, coming here to Paris and learning. I think it just, it brings so much to the city.

11:52And for people like me, who would never have come to Paris, I think you've got one person here that's here now because of it. So I can only imagine how many more there really are. When you think about this show, Emily in Paris, what kind of impact has it had on the city as a whole? I heard you just now being a bit annoyed that they shut down the streets. Yes, because it's a kind of privatisation of the public space, because we can't stay on the streets, because they need the street empty for the shooting. And it's a bit annoying for the people of Paris. For North American people, actually, I think it's very interesting for them to have that big picture of Paris and just to continue to have some dreams about it the way it is.

12:38Because if we really show them the reality of what is Paris, it will not be a dream anymore, actually. So just let's keep it like a fiction. And actually some of the people who feel most strongly about the portrayal of Emily in Paris are actually some of the Americans who live here. And as it happens, I have been speaking to one of them. She's called Lindsay Tremuta. She's a writer, a travel writer, and somebody who also gives tours in Paris. My main issue is why do we keep suggesting that showing real Paris in all of its complexity with its warts and its gifts and its beauty, why can't all of that coexist and still be a dream to people?

13:22Because ultimately people are still moving here. Yeah. It painted both Americans in a certain way and the French in a certain way very true to these old stereotypes. The dumb American, the entitled American who comes over thinking they can take over everything, run the show, get what they want, don't really need to speak the local language, and then the very arrogant but chic and put together minimally eating Parisian woman. What do you make of that, Asma? You know, I was talking to one of our producers earlier, and she described the show this way, and I thought it was really apt. She said, it's cringe, but it's fun.

13:58And so it's interesting to hear Lindsay's critique of it all, because I understand what she's saying is, why can't Paris be depicted more fully? But I'm also struck by that this is a show of Emily, a Midwestern American young woman who has never lived in Paris. And the story is told through the eyes of that naive experience. As we've touched on, the president of France seems to love that Emily in Paris exists as a show. I mean, he sees it, it seems, as a bit of soft power, a way to bring more filmmaking to France. Absolutely, yeah. Emmanuel Macron is all in on Emily in Paris. In fact, his wife Brigitte has even done a cameo in the show.

14:44Basically, Emmanuel Macron wants more foreign films and TV shows to be filmed in France. He says it's good for soft power, as you say, Asma, and also that it projects a positive image of France around the world. So he's brought in this reform sort of tax breaks to encourage filming under which expenses such as the salaries of non-European actors and hotels will qualify for a 30 % tax rebate if they're attached to a filming project. Now, I should say that France has a particularly big cinema tradition and also a big cinema industry and foreign investment that goes towards helping keep that alive is obviously very welcome.

15:27But his agenda and the agenda of people who live in Paris, actual Parisians, they don't necessarily coincide one with the other. Many Parisians might ask, why is Emmanuel Macron so strongly associating himself with a series that portrays French people in what they see as a negative light? And a common criticism of Emmanuel Macron that you hear in France is that he's detached from the needs and concerns of regular French people. So maybe his critics would say that's playing into all of this.

16:22experience and build positive money habits. It's an account co-owned by you and your teen, so you can monitor and engage with the account while your teen learns how to invest and manage money. Learn more at schwab.com. Tristan, as I listen to you explain the perspective that a number of Parisians have had towards Emily in Paris, I cannot help but think, okay, I understand. Maybe you don't feel like you're personally agreeing with the stereotypes or the cliches of your city, of your neighborhood. But this is not unique to Paris. I mean, haven't cities all over the world been coping with, you could say, or reaping from perhaps some of the economic benefits of TV and movie tourism?

17:04Sure. I think what this boils down to is probably I'm a bit of a nimby, aren't I? Not in my backyard. Well, we wanted to find out a little bit more about where else Europeans might be experiencing something a bit like this. And also in the United States, Our producer, Zandra Ellen, has been out and about in New York City where tourists all these years later are still flocking to one of the most iconic TV sets more than two decades after filming ended.

17:39Tristan, it's not just Paris that producer Darren Starr has created a fantasy world from of high fashion flings and lunchtime cocktails. He also, of course, brought Sex and the City to life on the streets of the West Village. The show about four fabulous girlfriends chasing love and thrills in New York from the 90s to the mid-2000s has left an indelible mark on this neighborhood. Why do I think living in Manhattan is so fantastic? Because it is. There's always a new neighborhood, a new restaurant, a new man.

18:14On a visit there last weekend, I met tourists from across the world who'd come all this way to taste the pink cupcakes at Magnolia Bakery or hop on board the three-and-a-half-hour Sex and the City bus tour. Was this an important stop on your trip? Yeah, because I love Sex and the City. Me too. No, me too. Do you identify as a Carrie? My favorite really is Charlotte. I love it, I love it, I love it. It feels like it's a good place to live. The West Village, with its beautiful buildings and lush foliage and delightful little bistros, has changed substantially over the decades. It's home to the Stonewall Inn, where in 1969, a police raid sparked riots that changed the course of the queer liberation movement.

18:59But today, with the average apartment selling for$1.5 million, the West Village has become a place for wealthy 20-somethings to live out the fantasy that Sex and the City helped create. And not everyone's super happy about the attention the show's brought to the neighborhood. While I'm there, a resident of the building where Sex and the City's protagonist, Carrie Bradshaw, lives, comes out to have a word with the Taurus on his stoop taking photos. He says, this never ends for us. It's the imposition that never ends for us. It strikes me that his objections might not be about loiterers at all. Maybe what he's really angry about is that he lives in a real place whose public mythology has been shaped, at least in some small part, by Darren Star's imagination.

19:46Well, in the interest of casting our net wide, we've been looking into the situation in London with our senior producer, Hannah Moore, who you've heard on the show before. Hannah's been down to Notting Hill, which is where the famous film was shot. The Richard Curtis film with Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts that came out way back in the late 90s. It's still having an effect on the neighbourhood now. Hannah has been looking into it for us. I've come to one of the most iconic filming locations of Notting Hill. It's the Notting Hill Bookshop, which features in the film as the travel book company, where Hugh Grant's character, William Thacker, works.

20:22And 27 years after the film came out, people are still coming here from all over the world. And I've been speaking to some of them. My name is Bianca. I'm 20. I'm from Australia. The film came out before you were born, right? How do you know about it? On TikTok. It's so popular on TikTok. I think that's what makes Notting Hill especially popular, because it's all on social media. My name is Frederico, and I came from Portugal. We came because we are huge fans of the film. I was expecting to see you grand here, but he's not here today. Oh, I'm so sorry we've disappointed you. He should be in there.

21:01I'm James Malin, and I'm one of the owners of the bookshop with my brother Howard. I've heard that you've had several proposals in the shop. Usually three to four each year. We have had people from Brazil and from Australia. We even had one guy from New York and he met a girl inside the shop. They went for a drink. 18 months later they came back for their anniversary. I think there's something in the air. maybe.

21:44I'm walking down the iconic Portobello Road. You'll have definitely seen pictures of this, the beautiful pastel coloured houses and it features prominently again in the Notting Hill film. Remember that scene of Hugh Grant walking down the market and the seasons changing around him. There's actually been a market here since the 1800s but in the past few decades tourism has just exploded here. Hi there, my name is Cheryl Devlin. I'm a green grocer in Port Bella Road. I've been here over 50 years and my family's been here 150 years. Blimey. And we're the last ones standing. How have you seen this area change?

22:26Well if you look around it's catering for tourists. my trade is totally finished we have a cardo delivering here to the houses above who are very wealthy people and I'm downstairs just come and see me you know let me say hi in the mornings they don't buy nothing is it social media then that's bringing people here could be I don't have one of them posh phone so I don't know what social media means but word of mouth yeah and it's meant to be a famous Portobello Road I can't see what's famous about it now and all the Characters are not here anymore. All the crazy people. No Notting Hill tour would be complete without a visit to the Blue Door.

23:04This is where Hugh Grant's character in the film lived, number 280 Westbourne Park Road. And I've just been watching people here over the past 10, 15 minutes come up, take a selfie. And it just reminds you that this is a film location, but it's also somebody's home. What's your name? Andrew. And you've lived in this area for 30 years, you said? Yeah, I used to work for the BBC down in Shepherd's Bush. all those years ago and I didn't know at the time I was living on a film set but two years after I bought it I was living on a film set and you can see this is an endless stream of people all day long all seasons on the pillars there used to be some very graphic language about tourists but as you can see today somebody has taken it off but from time to time the residents they do get annoyed I mean 10 o 'clock at night in the middle of January you'll come past and there'll be somebody doing a little Instagram.

23:57Thank you, Richard, for adding about 20 % extra value to my house. How much has it gone up in value? Because the average house price around here is like 1.6 million, which is like 2.2 million dollars. I can't say what I paid, but I can tell you that what I paid in 1996, it had already doubled by the year 2000, quadrupled by the year 2010. So I was very lucky. It sounds like there are definitely some positives and negatives to living in that maelstrom of Notting Hill, right? You know, one thing I was struck by in listening to those dispatches is how much tourism can live on and the scenes of movies and TV through TikTok and Instagram now in this new era.

24:42Well, it's interesting that you should mention that because our friend Lindsay Trimuto, who we heard from at the beginning, mentioned that. You know what? I'm going to say something that shouldn't be controversial, but maybe given the premise of the episode is that I would say if anything is starting to ruin certain spots in Paris, it's TikTok. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah, because the eyeballs on that platform, I would assume, far exceed anybody who's watching Emily in Paris. And you get these same places that are promoted by influencers and content creators over and over again to the point where there are lines out the door.

25:21You know, I find that the gap between the moment something opens and the moment that it now becomes overrun and lines out the door is very short. It would take a lot longer for that to happen in the past. So I would say, let's look to the content creators who turn everything into a piece of video that's going to be gobbled up and forgotten once they've been in the line by the thing and then go on to the next spot. So it sounds like really we should be making another episode called Did TikTok Ruin Tourism? I would listen to that and I would watch that. So, Asma, when I was in Place de l 'Etrepade, which is Emily Square, and I'd been hanging around talking to people there for a little while, and I started to feel a bit bad.

26:03I started to feel like a bit of a curmudgeon that maybe I should just get over myself. These people who come on holiday, they're taking nice photographs of each other, they're hanging out and having lunch. What harm could possibly come from that? So yeah, I found myself feeling a bit chastened at the end of all that. No hard feelings towards the people who come to visit Paris. You know, we're journalists. It's all about going and seeing things with your own eyes. You can criticize anyone for doing that. And I suppose the reality is now that more and more of my fellow Americans are traveling. You can look at the stats, Tristan, and now about 50 % of Americans have passports.

26:40When we were prepping for this story, I saw that it was less than 5 % of Americans who had passports in 1990, which is when that classic movie Home Alone came out, right? And they took a family trip to Paris in that movie. And so more Americans are traveling to Europe. And when we do that or when we travel elsewhere, we're able to see what the cliches are and how those cliches might jive or not with the reality we witness. I couldn't agree more. I'd say come one, come all, the more the merrier. Just don't assume that when you get here we're all drunk, chain-smoking, unfaithful, dirty, smelly people who never take a shower or indeed dressed as I am right now.