is a Franco–Belgian playwright, short story writer and novelist, as well as a film director. His plays have been staged in over fifty countries all over the world.
After preparatory classes at the Lycée du Parc for France's elite universities, Schmitt passed the entrance exam to the École normale supérieure. He was a student there between 1980 and 1985, leaving with the top French teaching qualification in philosophy (agrégé de philosophie). In 1987, he was awarded the degree of PhD for his thesis "Diderot and Metaphysics" at the Paris-Sorbonne University, which was published in 1997 with the title "Diderot or the Philosophy of Seduction".