Jean-Baptiste Iera

First seen in the 1998 Francine Meunier shorts "Don Juan" and "Antigone," Jean-Baptiste Iera paid his dues down the cast list in both features and teleplays before he started landing larger roles. Following the Yvan Attal comedy "Cantique de la racaille," the aspiring actor drama "L'Envoi" and the gangland saga "Les Déclassés," Iera took minor supports in the Thomas Gilou comedies "Chili con carne" and "Would I Lie to You? 2." However, Philippe Harel hired him as both actor and sports advisor on the 1970s-set cycling comedy "Ghislain Lambert's Bicycle," in which he played the swaggering racing team leader frustrating the ambitions of Belgian wannabe Benoît Poelvoorde. Also in 2002, Iera made the featurette "Le Labyrinthe" with Pierre Courrége, who co-scripted "Livraison à domicile," which saw Iera play alongside off-screen Belgian supermodel partner Ingrid Seynhaeve in the story of four friends who start up a delivery business and are entrusted with taking a valuable car to Corsica. The following year, Iera headlined another four-hander, "Don't Worry, Be Happy," as a struggling actor joining forces on a film script with a waspish critic and an Italian producer. Subsequently, Iera (who is sometimes billed as Gio Iera) took character parts in "Les Fragments d'Antonin," which focused on the traumas endured by veterans of the World War I trenches, and the fantasy comedy "Cinéman," in which a maths teacher ventures into movies to protect the girl of his dreams.