Jean-Marc Roulot Went From Studying Acting to Making Wine

He is the sixth generation in his family to run Domaine Roulot, an acclaimed Burgundy vineyard.

Jean-Marc Roulot
French actor and wine-grower Jean-Marc Roulot stands in front of stills of apricot alcohol in Meursault (Bourgogne) on November 14, 2017. (ERIC FEFERBERG/AFP/Getty Images)
AFP/Getty Images

Jean-Marc Roulot has acted in more than 50 television and film roles, including Story of Women (1988), Jeanne and the Perfect Guy (1998) and Diplomacy (2014). But he is also the proprietor and winemaker at Domaine Roulot, one of the most important properties in Meursault, a wine region in France that is the source of everyone’s favorite white Burgundy.

Earlier this year, Roulot was able to combine his two professions with the U.S. release of Back to Burgundy, a well-received feature directed by Cédric Klapisch about a Burgundian winemaking family struggling with issues of inheritance regarding the family domain. In the film, Roulot plays an estate manager who helps run things after the death of the patriarch.

Jean-Marc is the sixth generation of Roulots to run the Domaine Roulot, but he didn’t want the job at first. When his father died in 1982, Jean-Marc was just 26 and studying acting in Paris. He was reluctant to return home to start making wine. But in the winter of 1989, he had a change of heart and headed home, and he has been splitting time between his two passions ever since.

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