MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories
Oct 5, 2026 · 41 min · 19 segments
One afternoon in December 1980, one of the most famous comedians in France pulled a stack of letters from his mailbox in Paris. As he flipped through them, one caught his eye: It had no postmark or…
His 22-year-old girlfriend, Marie-Pierre Desaubris, was sitting next to him, and the energy between them was tense because Marie-Pierre did not want Rene to get on the train that was about to arrive.
He spent most of his time in Paris, where he worked as the stage manager for a very famous comedian, and he lived in an apartment with Marie-Pierre.
But the train he was waiting for now was about to take him back to his other life, which was on a farm 60 miles away in the town of Chateau-Thierry, where he lived with his longtime partner, Danielle, and their two kids.
Now, having a relationship with two different women was often very complicated for Rene, but it really wasn't a secret.
So in the beginning, the arrangement had been quite rocky because Rene at the time had been with Danielle exclusively for years before ever meeting Marie-Pierre and starting the affair.
But now she had a boyfriend on the side, too, and it seemed to Rene like she'd made peace with the whole situation and was at least reasonably happy with their overall arrangement.
But Marie-Pierre, Rene's girlfriend in Paris, who was currently sitting with him waiting for this train, was not fine with the overall arrangement.
She'd always been very jealous of his relationship with Danielle, and things really had only gotten even messier lately because Marie-Pierre was now seven months pregnant.
Rene had promised Marie-Pierre that he was going to leave Danielle and marry her, Marie-Pierre, as soon as the baby was born.
After all, Marie-Pierre had already left Rene twice before, and he was afraid to abandon his long-term family for a relationship that seemed somewhat unstable.
Right now, he really was not looking to add any more drama into his personal life.
And even though the campaign was essentially a joke, the current president took Coluche really seriously.
He viewed this comedian who, I mean, to everybody else it seemed like a shtick, he viewed this campaign as an actual threat to his re-election.
And so now it's like, you know, the, the powers that be in France were having this extreme reaction to Coluche, like, "This guy is a threat to us." In fact, government agencies were now actually tapping Coluche's phone, and the state-run TV and radio stations now suddenly wouldn't let him on the air.
And on top of that, perhaps the most sort of frightening aspect of Coluche's political rise here was that at least one person had been sending him death threats.
His 22-year-old girlfriend, Marie-Pierre Desaubris, was sitting next to him, and the energy between them was tense because Marie-Pierre did not want Rene to get on the train that was about to arrive.
He spent most of his time in Paris, where he worked as the stage manager for a very famous comedian, and he lived in an apartment with Marie-Pierre.
But the train he was waiting for now was about to take him back to his other life, which was on a farm 60 miles away in the town of Chateau-Thierry, where he lived with his longtime partner, Danielle, and their two kids.
Now, having a relationship with two different women was often very complicated for Rene, but it really wasn't a secret.
So in the beginning, the arrangement had been quite rocky because Rene at the time had been with Danielle exclusively for years before ever meeting Marie-Pierre and starting the affair.
But now she had a boyfriend on the side, too, and it seemed to Rene like she'd made peace with the whole situation and was at least reasonably happy with their overall arrangement.
But Marie-Pierre, Rene's girlfriend in Paris, who was currently sitting with him waiting for this train, was not fine with the overall arrangement.
She'd always been very jealous of his relationship with Danielle, and things really had only gotten even messier lately because Marie-Pierre was now seven months pregnant.
Rene had promised Marie-Pierre that he was going to leave Danielle and marry her, Marie-Pierre, as soon as the baby was born.
After all, Marie-Pierre had already left Rene twice before, and he was afraid to abandon his long-term family for a relationship that seemed somewhat unstable.
Right now, he really was not looking to add any more drama into his personal life.
And even though the campaign was essentially a joke, the current president took Coluche really seriously.
He viewed this comedian who, I mean, to everybody else it seemed like a shtick, he viewed this campaign as an actual threat to his re-election.
And so now it's like, you know, the, the powers that be in France were having this extreme reaction to Coluche, like, "This guy is a threat to us." In fact, government agencies were now actually tapping Coluche's phone, and the state-run TV and radio stations now suddenly wouldn't let him on the air.
And on top of that, perhaps the most sort of frightening aspect of Coluche's political rise here was that at least one person had been sending him death threats.
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