PARIS—French President Francois Hollande’s companion, actress Julie Gayet, has made her first appearance at an official ceremony that Hollande was also attending.
The 43-year-old was still far from playing the first lady’s role, however, never appearing Thursday by Hollande’s side.
Gayet was invited to accompany her grandfather, Alain Gayet, a 92-year-old French Resistance hero, to a ceremony commemorating Charles de Gaulle’s appeal of June 18, 1940, at the Mont Valerien memorial west of Paris. In his famous appeal, De Gaulle exhorted the French to resist the German occupation.
Dressed in black, Gayet arrived with her grandfather and listened to Hollande’s speech in the area reserved for important guests.
Hollande, 60, and Gayet have never denied being a couple, but they never made their relationship official either.
