Happily Married, also known as This Is How I Love You (French: C'est comme ça que je t'aime), is a Canadian French-language crime comedy drama television series, created and written by François Létourneau (who also stars), which premiered on ICI TOU.TV in 2020 and ran for three seasons until 2024. The series takes place in the summers of 1974, 1975, and 1976, and tells the story of two couples living in Sainte-Foy, in the city area of Quebec, who fall into crime.
The series' original French title is taken from the 1974 song of the same name by singer Mike Brant, released the same year in which the first season is set.
Contents
Premise
Set in Quebec City in the 1970s, the series centres on the Delisles and the Paquettes, two married couples in suburban Sainte-Foy who deal with problems in their marriages by embarking on a crime spree while their children are away at summer camp. The first season takes place in 1974, the second in 1975, and the third in 1976.
Framing device
The series opens with on-screen text that reads:
"This series has been possible thanks to the invaluable contribution of Gilles Tétreault-Boivin's book
The Gangsters of Sainte-Foy: Chronology of a Love Tragedy
published by True Stories Editions."
This is a storytelling device that frames the plot as a depiction of a "true story", but similar to the film and television series Fargo, it is merely a narrative conceit and not genuinely factual, and the book and true crime author do not exist in reality.
Creator François Létourneau had pitched this idea in order to get the series greenlit, jokingly presenting the story to Radio-Canada as though it had genuinely occurred, and it led to some real-world confusion, media speculation and erroneous news reports that the events were based on a real pair of couples who became involved in crime; however, Létourneau clarified in an interview that it wasn't actually true and was a fictional story, and the series' official FAQ page likewise states plainly that it is fiction and not a true story, with Richard Therrien from the Quebec newspaper Le Soleil describing the series as a fausse histoire vraie ("false true story", or more naturally "fake true story"/"phony true story"). Instead, Létourneau has said the series' premise was inspired by a personal memory: driving his son to summer camp reminded him of his own childhood, during which his parents separated shortly after he returned from a similar camp.
Cast and characters
The series stars François Létourneau and Marilyn Castonguay as Gaétan and Huguette Delisle, and Patrice Robitaille and Karine Gonthier-Hyndman as Serge and Micheline Paquette. Supporting cast members include Sophie Desmarais (as Marie-Josée Bolduc), Rémi-Pierre Paquin (as René Croteau), Jean-François Provençal, René Richard Cyr, Patrick Drolet, Chantal Fontaine, Mani Soleymanlou, Mathieu Gosselin, Steve Laplante, Richardson Zéphir, Agathe Ledoux, Jocelyne Zucco, Charlotte Le Bon, Yves Jacques, Robert Lepage, Xavier Dolan, Pier-Luc Funk, Catherine Trudeau, Hubert Proulx, Gaston Lepage, Fabien Dupuis, Luc Morissette and Michel Perron.
Production
The series was directed by Jean-François Rivard, who was joined by Robin Aubert as co-director from the second season onward. It was produced by Productions Casablanca. The second season was filmed between June and October 2021, and began airing on March 3, 2022. The third and final season began airing on March 1, 2024.
The series has been described as a thematic spiritual successor and genre hybrid between creators François Létourneau and Jean-François Rivard's two previous series, Les Invincibles and Série Noire, "combining the horrors of married life with crime".
Episodes
Broadcast and distribution
The series received a preview screening at the 70th Berlin International Film Festival, and all 10 episodes of the first season began streaming on the paid "Extra" tier of ICI TOU.TV on March 6, 2020, before being broadcast weekly on the free over-the-air ICI Radio-Canada Télé channel later that year, from September 16 to November 18.
A second season of ten episodes was announced in early 2021 and released in 2022, with the first six episodes debuting on TOU.TV "Extra" on March 3 and the latter four a week later on March 10, while the Radio-Canada Télé weekly broadcast aired from September 14 to November 16.
A third and final season of eight episodes released on TOU.TV on March 1, 2024, with a Radio-Canada Télé weekly broadcast following from September 11 to October 30, bringing the series' total run to 28 episodes across three seasons.
A version subtitled in English was made available on CBC Gem for English-Canadian audiences under the Happily Married title. The series was also picked up for distribution in France on the streaming service Salto, as one of its first international acquisitions; however, the service closed down in 2023. In the United States, the series is distributed by MHz Choice, but it only has the first two seasons since the third was never licensed to it.
The series is currently available on ICI TOU.TV "Extra" and CBC Gem in its entirety, and MHz Choice for its first two seasons.
Awards
The series won 10 Prix Gémeaux in 2020, including the award for Best Dramatic Series, and later received a Prix Gémeaux for Best Editing in a Dramatic Work.
In 2021, the show won the Rogers Prize for Excellence in Canadian Content at the Banff World Media Festival.
At the 2023 Gala Les Olivier, the series won the award for Comedic Fiction Series of the Year for its second season.
