The Story
MIRIAM SANDERS, a Mormon wife and mother, faces an existential crisis from a lifetime of painting ducks in her world of powder blue in Ketchum, Idaho.
As she's about to end it all with her powder blue designer rifle, the ghost of ERNEST HEMINGWAY appears, head in hand, and advises her not to do it: "It tends to turn out badly," he says. Instead, he tells her she needs to find her green flash.
Ernest instructs her to go to Paris and rent the tiny room on the top floor of an old apartment building with a crazy tilt – the very room where he found his green flash as a young man in Paris.
Miriam paints a painting that makes a statement to her husband PETER SANDERS and guests at her 25th Anniversary party and leaves for Paris and 22 Rue Danou . . .
. . . where she is promptly pickpocketed by a SPANISH GYPSY, whose girlfriend, CLAY, a sculptress, lives on one of the floors of the strange building with a crazy tilt at 22 Rue Danou.
CLAUDE DULUC, a third-generation oyster shucker, takes the penniless Miriam under his wing. But Claude has a secret: He hates oyster-shucking. Haunted by belittling ancestors, he believes himself to be the fictional detective, Miss Marple.
Claude introduces Miriam to the landlady at 22 Rue Danou, MADAME VALLET, a washed-up torch singer who refuses to accept her age or her mail – as delivered by MSSR. LA POSTE – Ernest Hemingway – who has arrived to help Miriam find her green flash.
Clay, the sculptress, believes she is a true artist, and not a commercial duck painter like Miriam, but she, too, has a dark secret.
ZIGGY, the old World War I veteran who helped Hemingway liberate the wine cellar at the Ritz, owns Le Club Hot, and offers Miriam a new name and a job, dancing in -- what else? -- a duck costume.
Miriam's husband, Peter, follows her to Paris and attempts to reconcile.
Will the Gypsy make bail?
Will Clay impress Mimi with her authentic sculptures?
Will Ziggy and Madame Vallet reconnect?
Will Miriam find her green flash?
Will Peter stay, or go?
MIMI LE DUCK is about authenticity, and finding one’s true voice.
But most of all, MIMI LE DUCK is about love.