Vanda Maria Ribeiro Furtado Tavares de Vasconcelos (born 17 June 1962), known professionally as Lio, is a Portuguese-Belgian singer and actress who was a pop icon in France and Belgium during the 1980s. In 2024 she began serving as a judge on Drag Race Belgium.
Vanda Maria Ribeiro Furtado Tavares de Vasconcelos was born on 17 June 1962 in Mangualde, Portugal. When her father was called up to fight in the Portuguese Army, the family moved to Mozambique. Her parents divorced and, in 1968, Vanda moved with her mother and new stepfather to Brussels, Belgium, where her sister, actress Helena Noguerra, was born. In her teens she was determined to become a singer, and she was encouraged by singer-songwriter Jacques Duvall (né Eric Verwilghem), a family friend. She took her stage name, Lio, from a character in the Barbarella comic books by Jean-Claude Forest.
In 1979, together with songwriter Jay Alanski, she and Duvall began working with Marc Moulin and Dan Lacksman from the electro-trio Telex. Her first two singles were "Le Banana Split", which sold over 1 million copies, and "Amoureux solitaires", a song originally by punk rock band Stinky Toys. Both songs rose to the top of many pop charts in France, and Moulin and Lacksman also produced her self-titled first album. In 1982 the American music duo Ron and Russell Mael, of Sparks, worked with her on the album Suite sixtine, on which some of her previous songs were translated into English. Suite sixtine was compiled and art directed by Ralph Alfonso for Attic Records Canada, where it was originally released. Her second album, Amour toujours, was produced by Alain Chamfort and released in 1983. The same year, she first appeared on the screen in Chantal Akerman's film Golden Eighties, a lighthearted, humorous French pop musical about the people who work together in a Parisian shopping center. Lio plays a carefree hairdresser in the movie.. In 1984, she was featured in a TV special with France Gall called “Formule 1”, where she sang "Be My Baby" with Gall.
In 1985, she met record company executive and producer Michel Esteban, of ZE Records. She continued to have hit singles in Europe, including "Les brunes comptent pas pour des prunes", and travelled to Los Angeles with Esteban to record her next album Pop model. Several of the tracks were co-produced by John Cale, formerly of the Velvet Underground, and the album produced the hits "Fallait pas commencer", "Je casse tout ce que je touche", and "Chauffeur". In 1988, after she had given birth to a daughter with Esteban, she resumed her acting career, starring in Claude Lelouch's film Itinéraire d'un enfant gâté. The Lio-Esteban partnership produced another album, Can can, recorded in Los Angeles and Rio de Janeiro. She also designed a fashion collection for the European department store chain Prisunic. ...
Drama · Adventure
A foundling, raised in the circus, Sam Lion becomes a businessman after a trapeze accident. However, when he reaches fifty and becomes tired of his responsibilities and of his son Jean-Philippe, he decides to disappear at sea. However, he runs into Albert Duvivier, one of his former employees. He comes to realise that he has ignored the important things in his life.
7.21988
Comedy
Die-hard fans of the 1980s, Vincent and Antoine run a company that supplies doubles of faded stars throughout the whole of France. What starts out as a promising business venture ends up as a calamity when Vincent and Antoine have over forty engagements booked but no one to attend them. They then have a brainwave. Why not get in touch with the real stars of the 1980s and persuade them to make a comeback? Why make do with an imitation when you can have the real McCoy?
5.72012
Drama · Romance
Secrets, rumors and betrayals surround the upcoming marriage between a young dissolute man and virtuous woman of the French aristocracy.
5.82007
Drama · Romance
Like many of her classmates, 12 year old tomboy Juliette has a crush on Mrs. Solenska, a teacher distinguished by stylish attire and an uninhibited, provocative classroom demeanor. Juliette's fascination turns into all-consuming obsession, forcing revelations from both the girl and her teacher.
5.82009
Drama
Anna, a young teenager, comes home from her Catholic boarding school for the holidays and discovers her father has left. Her mother is devastated and confined in the company of the local priest, who is also a childhood friend. Anna clings to her beloved grandfather. She also grows close to Pierre, a free-spirited teenager who cares little about God. Anna is preparing for her confirmation, but her budding desire for Pierre shakes her faith. She longs to give herself over, body and soul... but doesn't know if it is to God, or something else?
5.62010
Comedy · Horror
Dorothy’s a film director and a bit of a loser. One night, after a few beers, she lets loose on her script when a call from her producer kills her buzz: enough with the queer comedies, it’s time to start making mainstream films. To avoid sinking to the deepest depths of despair, Dorothy seeks comfort in her favorite TV show "Romy the Vampire Slayer". Unfortunately, her own demons show up.
5.22022
Drama · Crime
Ismael breaks into the house of a fine art restorer and shoots the homeowner dead, leaving her daughter orphaned and traumatized for life. Years later, Ismael is working in a bar where he sees the daughter again. Paranoid that she has recognised him and will report him, he kidnaps her and holds her hostage, demanding that her hospital pay a ransom for her release. As he spends more time with her, a strange bond develops that causes him to delay the ransom request or fulfil his threats of throwing her in front of a train. But he can’t delay forever…
6.21993
Drama · Adventure
A foundling, raised in the circus, Sam Lion becomes a businessman after a trapeze accident. However, when he reaches fifty and becomes tired of his responsibilities and of his son Jean-Philippe, he decides to disappear at sea. However, he runs into Albert Duvivier, one of his former employees. He comes to realise that he has ignored the important things in his life.
7.21988
Comedy
Die-hard fans of the 1980s, Vincent and Antoine run a company that supplies doubles of faded stars throughout the whole of France. What starts out as a promising business venture ends up as a calamity when Vincent and Antoine have over forty engagements booked but no one to attend them. They then have a brainwave. Why not get in touch with the real stars of the 1980s and persuade them to make a comeback? Why make do with an imitation when you can have the real McCoy?
5.72012
Music · Comedy
Vincent and Antoine, tired of the tours, decide to go on holiday with all the troop of Stars 80.
4.52017
Comedy · Drama
A wedding is an opportunity for three couples of different generations to question commitment and the strength of love.
5.22004
Drama · Romance
Secrets, rumors and betrayals surround the upcoming marriage between a young dissolute man and virtuous woman of the French aristocracy.
5.82007
Music · Comedy
In a lively shopping center, proprietors and customers are bustling, including three women vying for a man's heart with song and dance.
6.51986
Drama · Romance
Like many of her classmates, 12 year old tomboy Juliette has a crush on Mrs. Solenska, a teacher distinguished by stylish attire and an uninhibited, provocative classroom demeanor. Juliette's fascination turns into all-consuming obsession, forcing revelations from both the girl and her teacher.
5.82009
Drama · Romance
Georges Deblache, a despondent middle-aged cop, falls for his partner's wife.
4.91991
Drama
Anna, a young teenager, comes home from her Catholic boarding school for the holidays and discovers her father has left. Her mother is devastated and confined in the company of the local priest, who is also a childhood friend. Anna clings to her beloved grandfather. She also grows close to Pierre, a free-spirited teenager who cares little about God. Anna is preparing for her confirmation, but her budding desire for Pierre shakes her faith. She longs to give herself over, body and soul... but doesn't know if it is to God, or something else?
5.62010
Comedy · Horror
Dorothy’s a film director and a bit of a loser. One night, after a few beers, she lets loose on her script when a call from her producer kills her buzz: enough with the queer comedies, it’s time to start making mainstream films. To avoid sinking to the deepest depths of despair, Dorothy seeks comfort in her favorite TV show "Romy the Vampire Slayer". Unfortunately, her own demons show up.
5.22022
Drama · Crime
Ismael breaks into the house of a fine art restorer and shoots the homeowner dead, leaving her daughter orphaned and traumatized for life. Years later, Ismael is working in a bar where he sees the daughter again. Paranoid that she has recognised him and will report him, he kidnaps her and holds her hostage, demanding that her hospital pay a ransom for her release. As he spends more time with her, a strange bond develops that causes him to delay the ransom request or fulfil his threats of throwing her in front of a train. But he can’t delay forever…
6.21993
Drama
The meeting of two lonely, marginal souls. There is Henri, a man in his 50s, limp, resigned, somewhat alcoholic. And Rosette, a woman who dreams of love, sexuality, normality
6.42013
Romance · Drama
Lola is an independent woman, a professional writer with 2 men on a string. Both men are married with children. When the men, and Lola, face having to make choices, Lola's comfortable life becomes less appealing.
5.51992
Drama
After a bull is killed in a bullfight, its body parts are transported across Spain, France, Italy and Belgium. The bull's parts fall into the wide variety of people, including: an Italian actress selling the bones in a supermarket promotion, a Spanish woman who dines on its steaks, a little girl in France who imagines a world where animals are much larger than humans, and a taxidermist whose wife is simultaneously giving birth to quintuplets.
5.52002
Drama
A budding electronica artist gives up his shot at stardom to pursue a woman from a telephone dating network.
4.62005
Comedy · TV Movie
The Stievenart family decides to spend their vacation far away and puts an ad on the internet. The Mailon family responds by offering to exchange homes. But the Stievenart family has an environmentally friendly house, while the Mailons consume a lot of energy.
5.92011
Comedy
Martin and Gert lead a very quiet life, until the day when their path crosses that of Marie and Francis. Martin, the shy one, lets himself be seduced by Marie. Gert wasted no time in understanding and dropped into Francis' arms.
5.31989
Drama · TV Movie
Threatened and beaten by her ex-husband for many months, Julie Douib, 34, mother of two young children, had gone to file a complaint many times. On March 3, 2019, Julie was shot by her ex-partner in L'île Rousse in Haute-Corse. On the night of 16 to 17 April 2018, after several years of domestic violence, Laura Rapp finally found the courage to file a complaint: her spouse tried to strangle her in front of their two-year-old daughter. After a year of pre-trial detention for attempted homicide, her ex-spouse is released pending trial.
7.72022
Comedy · Drama
Several lives intersect when a middle-aged woman is left by her husband, and she decides to trek him down with the help of her equally troubled sister.
4.31994
Drama · Thriller
A rebellious teenager and a "border-line" young nurse will learn to tame each other and get a fresh start in life...
5.42007
Documentary · Music
Half a century ago, Brazilian composer and musician Antonio Carlos "Tom" Jobim (1927-1994) introduced bossa nova to a worldwide audience with "The Girl from Ipanema." This relaxed, cool, sensuous music blended jazz and samba. After recording an album of songs by his friend Jobim, Frank Sinatra is reported to have said, "I haven't sung so quietly since I had laryngitis." Naturally, "The Girl from Ipanema" and Frank Sinatra are featured in this musical collage of countless seamlessly edited excerpts of concert footage that cover decades of events all over the world: from Rio de Janeiro to Lisbon, Paris, Copenhagen, Jerusalem, Tokyo, Montreal, New York and back to Rio.
Documentary · History
55 years ago, on October 1 1968, the first brand advertising spot appeared on the French television screen. Over the next three decades, thousands of creative little films would seduce and build our collective memory. Kitschy or cult spots, humor, slogans, music, stars, gimmicks, grand spectacle or sex appeal: during its golden age, how did advertising convince? Thierry Ardisson has brought together almost 400 advertising clips to relive the era of the conquest of minds and wallets.
6.52023
Drama · TV Movie
Manuel passes 18 months at Buchenwald before his return to Paris. He wonders even before his arrival who will have the patience and passion to listen to his narrative. He chooses silence.
1.82011
Comedy
The mother of three children seems to become romantically involved with the man playing Don Juan in the same local countryside theatre where she is acting. The children decide to try to poison the man who is threatening their family life. The real life and the stage roles get intertwined...
Comedy · Drama
Pierre is a womanizing photographer, with a slight mean streak. For whatever reason, Camille, an artist in her own right, finds him entrancing and easily succumbs to his devious efforts to get her into bed. Soon she is trying to hold him to her with her oh-so submissive love, and he is playing some games with her head by pretending (usually) to have been playing around with others. Eventually, he encounters another woman who is not so sticky and tells her to buzz off. When they meet some time later, it becomes clear that the relationship meant different things to each of them.
3.71991
Documentary · Music
Music
Music
Documentary · Crime
In 2003, rock singer Bertrand Cantat killed his partner, actress Marie Trintignant. This documentary revisits the case that divided a nation.
7.72025
Talk
Quotidien (nicknamed "The French Show with the Good Lighting" abroad) is a French daily infotainment television program broadcast in the early evening on TMC since September 12, 2016. The show is hosted by Yann Barthès and produced by Bangumi. It consists of segments and reports produced by the team of commentators and journalists surrounding Yann Barthès and features daily guests including newsmakers, intellectuals, politicians, and French and international celebrities.
5.12016
Reality
Star Academy is a French reality television show produced by the Dutch company Endemol. It consists of a contest of young singers. It spawned an equally successful show in Quebec called Star Académie. It is broadcast on TF1. At the end of each season, selected contestants would go on tour around France, Morocco, Switzerland, Belgium, Tunisia, and other French-speaking countries.
5.72001
Crime · Drama
Hunting down killers to help bereaved families get justice is more than just a job; it’s a duty for Thomas Bareski, a retired, hotshot police detective eager to reopen unsolved murder cases in a mission to find the culprits.
7.02019
Reality
6.52011
Reality
For the first time in its herstory, Belgium is welcoming the most glamorous drag competition. Hosted by the great French-Canadian diva, Rita Baga, Drag Race Belgique will demonstrate the immense talent and creativity of its drag scene. So be prepared for their audacity and authenticity!
4.72023
Talk
6.81982
Talk
3.61998
Talk
6.11987
Reality
Twelve celebrities are masked under spectacular costumes, with their identity hidden. They compete by singing their own versions of songs, and the judges and audience must guess who is behind each mask!
5.62019
Comedy · Talk
8.61990
Documentary · Soap
Talk
5.71987
Talk
Every day live on FRANCE 5, Anne-Élisabeth Lemoine and her team receive those who make the news. In the second part, the program welcomes, around a meal prepared by a qualified chef, artists in promotion.
6.12009
Talk
5.62003
Talk · News
Le Grand Échiquier is a French variety television program created and presented by Jacques Chancel. It aired at 8:30 pm on the first channel of the ORTF from January 12, 1972 to July 12, 1972, then on the second color channel of the ORTF from September 1972 to December 1974, and finally on Antenne 2 from January 1975 to December 21, 1989. The program returned to France 2 on December 20, 2018 and is hosted by Anne-Sophie Lapix.
8.01972
Reality
6.51984
Reality
Midi Première is a French variety show presented by Danièle Gilbert, directed by Jacques Pierre and broadcast from January 6, 1975 until January 1, 1982 on TF1. The program was generally broadcast between 12:15 p.m. and 12:55 p.m., then giving way to the 1:00 p.m. TV news. However, the broadcast schedule could change, depending on the guests, and the setting where the recording of the program was shot. Certain performances by artists who have become cult like the one where Ringo jostles with a demonstrator in interpretation (1977), that of Dalida with the title There is always a song with the soundtrack that does not start, twice, at the right speed (1978), Claude François and his Clodettes, who, in the provinces, are unable to join "the set" in order to interpret his song, the latter being taken by the crowd of delirious fans (summer 1977) . The group Supertramp performed there with the title "Dreamer" on March 8, 1975.
9.01975
Drama · Reality
Colette, une femme libre is a two-part French biographical TV film directed in 2003 by Nadine Trintignant and broadcast on January 25 and February 1, 2004 on RTBF, then on April 26 and April 27, 2004 on France 2. A biography of French writer Colette, it was also the last role for Marie Trintignant, who was killed by her partner Bertrand Cantat shortly before the end of filming at the end of July 2003.
9.02004
Reality
A French variety show.
7.51975
Talk · Kids
Host Jacques Martin invites different talented children from various backgrounds to showcase their beautiful voices. The participants entertain and wow the audience with their lovely performances.
7.21977