"We Have To See The Soul Of The Actor"

To start with, we all danced to music and Philippe would call us out one by one to take centre stage and imitate a fitness teacher, or a priest. I tried the fitness teacher, and played a gruff macho sports trainer: "Are you pussies ready to burn that lard off your fat asses?" ... but got killed immediately.

  "Not subtle at all." Oh yeah. You have to be really subtle with Bouffon. To speak about a subject, you can't just bang it on the head and say it outright. You have to slowly go there, slyly almost, so that the audience loves you and comes with you, and then you shock them.

~

Today we had gay Bouffon couples come and perform in front of an audience of anti-gay activists. 

Philippe suggested we speak tenderly with our partner about our love...how we met...our dreams for the future...children...etc. And through this, the actors should mock, or push the buttons, of the anti-gay activists in the audience. Although nobody really got to this point too much. However one couple - Mark & Tim - got close. They were gentle and tender with each other with good complicité - we loved them - and then as the left the stage walking slowly backwards they said "fuck you" in the same gentle tone.

Most of the groups afterwards had trouble to find something interesting/funny/alive (it's a trap to try to be funny) and all tended to try and do what Tim and Mark had done. But Philippe said it can't just be a copy of them. "Each has to have it's own tenderness."He also spoke about how "we have to see the soul of the actor" and not just a character. We have to see the individual actor and what he/she has to say.

I got up towards the end (was feeling a bit of self-doubt today) and André joined me as my gay partner. We started pretty rockily, and Philippe immediately started to make fun of us, so we changed. 

We spoke in kind of Australian old-lady accents and when I said "I love you" André replied "you don't mean it" (great offer) which led to us having a little tiff. And Philippe said now it looks like we're having a divorce! So we steered it away slightly. "I don't want a divorce honey. I just don't like it when you speak to me like that." People started laughing and we had a nice complicité together. A good game. Pleasure. And we listened well. After a while, Philippe lead us to say farewell to each other, to leave in separate directions and then walk in a circle and arrive again to meet once more. We did so, and the scene was kind of a romantic comedy moment. "You look fantastic." "So do you." "Wow, what are the chances." "Tell me about it. It's been a long time." And we got close again, and the scene ended with us saying we'd love each other with wrinkles and all. 

Philippe said what we did wasn't the Bouffon he was trying to lead us to today, in the sense that we weren't so much playing with the audience and that we weren't particularly 'saying something', but he said  it was "beautiful" and "very good." He said we should write this. So we will! I imagine what we did worked because of the mix between the grotesque way we looked and the beauty of our relationship. It's interesting and heartwarming. A little like how an audience might fall in love with a handicapped couple who get married in a documentary.

~

Afterwards, people also improvised in couples shopping at Mothercare and an expensive jewellery store.

"A Bouffon who plays a nouveau riche could be good."

This made me think of doing a scene of Bouffons lining up overnight for the latest iPhone. A kind of public display of wealth and devotion to fashionable material objects, in a way.

Finally a big Bouffon group all mocked French people. It really worked when people hit on the blasé laziness of the French. "Bah oui...mais no!...Putain...tsk....merde..."

Philippe emphasised again that we're not looking for "hahaha" grotesque, but something beautiful and special.