Wisconsin's Weekend Morning News
WWMN Interview: Anne LePlae from Alliance Française de Milwaukee Talks About Bastille Days 7-7-24
(upbeat music) And welcome back to the final half hour of Wisconsin Week in Morning News. I'm Libby Collins. Well, we look forward to it every year. And that's about steel days right here in Milwaukee. And joining us on our Tri County Contracting Hotline is Anne LePlay. She is the Executive Director at Alliance Francais, which apparently has been educating local residents on everything French for over 100 years and Bonjour, Anne. Bonjour. Thank you for calling. That's about all I know. But a hundred years Alliance Francais has really been delving deep into French culture. Yes, we've been here since 1918. So since the last pandemic, which is an interesting sort of circle of event. Well, this year about steel days gets underway on Thursday. And tell us a little bit about what to expect this year. Well, we're bringing back all the favorites, the five K-run on Thursday night, the Eiffel Tower. And of course, so it's a wonderful beignets. There's fantastic food. We do the beignets, but there's also Lake Park Bistro Laniac, Amy's African food Lake and Crow Daddy's. So there'll be over 25 food vendors and a lot of marketplace French items. And just it's going to be so much fun. And the entertainment on five stages during the whole four days, it's going to be a nonstop party. And I know that you have a lot of groups that aren't necessarily French. You've got the can-can dancers and some French expert. Oh, you've got some other ones too. Right, there's the extra crispy brass band that's coming that's going to launch the race and it's playing just about every day. Our good friend Kevin Susie has a French song. You mentioned the can-can dancers and some New Orleans music. It is definitely going to be just really fun, kind of danceable music just to make a really fun party. Oh, I see you've got Ben Muellano, who we've featured on WTMJ Conversations a while back. He's going to be one of the performers as well. So it is a good variety. Now, here's what a lot of people are wondering. Next Sunday is the start of the RNC. Cathedral Square Park is right there in the center of where some of that security zone is. Is that going to affect anything on your end? No, the security zone is actually starting a little bit west of Bastille days. Let's start that about the river. So it shouldn't affect the event. I do think it might affect parking and driving ground, but as far as the event is concerned, it'll have the benefit of having a few more people at the party, so we're super excited about it. What would you suggest in terms of parking and getting there? Because obviously, I think they started at 5 a.m. on Sunday as far as the soft zone and the hard zone and all of that. Do you have any recommendations? Yes, so Easttown suggests visiting secureparkingusa.com just to get ideas for parking, but we also recommend that people come either by public transportation, the hop, maybe by bike. Just to plan ahead, because parking will be, it's always an issue, it's an issue because of the run, just because it's a popular downtown festival, but if you plan ahead, you'll be fine. And obviously, you've got the RNC delegates who are gonna be arriving next weekend. Are you planning anything special to welcome them to Milwaukee? I think we just plan on having the best event possible, making for us, making the best vignettes and making maybe a few extras. We just want to encourage all the visitors, both the delegates and all the media and everyone that's coming around to see how wonderful Milwaukee is and our festival tradition is fantastic. Bastille Day in Milwaukee is the biggest Bastille celebration in North America, bigger than New York, Chicago and anywhere in Sydney and Canada. So we're really proud of what we do and excited to show it to out of towners. - Is there a large French community in the city in Southeastern Wisconsin? - Well, I don't know if you knew this, but the first mayor of Milwaukee, Solomon Tuna was a French man from Canada. We have a very deep French history. There's a lot of French names on the map. There's not a huge French population, but there's a growing Francophone population. So French people from, obviously France, Canada, but also from African countries that speak French, Haiti, the Caribbean, et cetera. So we're seeing a growing population of people who speak French, but not who are not necessarily from France. - Well, I think a lot of people are looking forward to Bastille Day is one of the most fun events in Milwaukee during the summer. And we'll play from a lion's phone size. Thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you. It was a pleasure talking with you.