Born in Toulon on 13 August 1959, Philippe Bonifay chose two professional routes for himself: “social” and “show business”. He began training as an actor at the age of 14 and completed his first BAFA traineeship (for a children’s camp instructor certificate) at 17. Cartoons only came to him a short while later as a “pleasant” spiral in which he got caught up.

His cartoon work began in 1980-81, while he was in the army. While on a BAFA traineeship two years previously, he had got on well with the wife of an author and had met the author in question. It was Christian Rossi. They had two or three pleasures in common, one of which was westerns. Together, they produced three of the four serials (and one complete story) of “Chariot de Thespis” for Gomme followed by Circus.

When Glénat publishing asked him to write a new concept, he produced a fantasy mini-series for Jacques Terpant, called “Le Passage de la saison morte”, followed by the album “Les Ados de béton” for Arnaud Fontaine.

In 1994, he started at Dargaud with Terpant and edited the historical epic trilogy “Messara”. He wrote for theatre and changed his media. That was where he got caught up in the spiral.

For Bonifay, cartoons are exciting and have great assets. But they also have their limits, particularly for someone coming from theatre. He once wanted to stop, just before Frank asked him to do “Zoo”. He would have regretted that for a long time, as this psychological animal-based piece of work is the two artists” current magnum opus.