Brigitte Macron shoved French president Emmanuel Macron in the face as they disembarked a plane in Vietnam last year after she allegedly discovered texts he had sent to an Iranian actress, according to a new book.
The incident went viral last year prompting speculation of a rift and subsequent denials by the couple who insisted that they were just “joking”.
However a new account suggests that the real reason behind the altercation is that the first lady was angry after she saw a text by Emmanuel to exiled Iranian-French actress Golshifteh Farahani, says Florian Tardif in Un Couple (Presque) Parfait — An (Almost) Perfect Couple.
Tardif, a political correspondent at Paris Match magazine, alleges that Mrs Macron, 73, was fearful that her husband, 48, may leave her for the actress after seeing the exchange.
Farahani, 42, has denied rumours that the pair were having an affair when questioned by journalists and has said that their connection was “platonic”.
The content of the messages are reported to have gone “quite far” and included comments such as “I find you very pretty”, Tardif told RTL radio in interviews promoting his book.
However, a source close to Mrs Macron “categorically denied” the claims when Tardif interviewed them in March and insisted that she “never looks into her husband’s phone”, according to Le Parisien.
“Everything in the book is facts, facts and only facts,” Tardif has insisted.
The author has also reportedly interviewed Mrs Macron for the book who said that she was “very tired” after a difficult flight when asked about the interaction.
”There was a lot of turbulence during the flight, which stopped me sleeping,” she said. “Right then, I didn’t want to get out [of the aircraft]. He tried to make me laugh. He gave me some water and I pushed him away.”
The Independent has contacted representatives for Farahani and Mr and Mrs Macron.
An Elysee official initially played down the moment at the time of the incident last year, saying: “It was a moment when the president and his wife were relaxing one last time before the start of the trip by having a laugh.”
Macron later admitted that the couple had been “squabbling” and that the attention to the incident was surprising to him.
“We are squabbling and, rather, joking with my wife,” he told reporters at the time. “I’m surprised by it, it turns into some kind of global catastrophe where people are even coming up with theories to explain it. It’s nonsense.”
