"You Can't Do Everything You Want To Do. You Have To Do [Things] Round Your Clown."

Philippe opened the class today by saying "to be honest… on Friday I was fucking surprised... so many people discovered something… after three weeks... I never saw that." 

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A few people showed auto-course numbers from last week:

Katie presented a number in which she did some bad Irish dance and then told us the story of Othello with an Irish accent.

"The dance, why not? But the speech… Impossible... Not naïve enough."

He then got Katie to make various different sounds with her mouth – a trumpet, washing machine, the sound of an English breakfast cooking, an old telephone, creaky stairs - and then got her to tell us the story of Othello but make one of those sounds every time he hit his drum (which was a lot).

"You have to discover a way to speak. If you speak normal, it's not clown."

~

Boris did a number in which he had trouble introducing himself. But he did some gestures and actions that seem quite habitual - little things that say 'it's not great, let's try again' or along that line - but they weren't clear. They were for him, but not for us.

"We have to understand what you want… You are an idiot… But you want to show something… And I don't understand what you want."

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Michaela's number was a flop from the start...but then she brought out a list of everything she has to do to be a good clown (very German) and we started to like her. Philippe then got her to speak very loud in German - to pretend to be furious - and she started banging her caveman club against her head...which was bizarre but funny.

"Never will you be charming 'classic'… But like this you are charming."

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Michael did a solo number in which he switched between two characters, but he was laughing to himself as if he though it was funny. Philippe had an issue with him laughing, because the audience feels cheated if he laughs but we don't. 

"We want to see a guy happy to be on the stage but not laughing."

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Philippe then announced that the next exercise will be in the Sloven language. "Sloven is a bit Serbian… A bit Russian."

The director of the circus says you have to save the show because the actors can't make it. It's a slovenian production of Romeo and Juliet. But the actor who plays Romeo is in Moscow and the actress who plays Juliet is in New York. A you know about the show is that there is a balcony.

So essentially...have fun pretending that you can speak Slovenian very well!

Most of us were really bad at this exercise. Lots of flops. But Boris found something good by pretending to cry. Philippe reminded him that he should cry "not because you're sad...[but] because it makes the audience laugh."

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"You want to make us laugh and you want to stay on the stage"

"You can't do everything you want to do. You have to do [things] round your clown."

"Follow one idea and you're going to discover something fantastic...When you have one idea you are an idiot fantastic."

"You have to try everyday something new."

"I don't know if it has to be you, but we have to trust you as a stupid human being."

 "You have to feel the flop and to react… To show something absolutely special."

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Auto-course for next week: We go to Monsieur Marcel because we want to play Cleopatra by William Shakespeare. Monsieur Marcel says "Cleopatra without Anthony is nothing..." and that's all!