PRESENTATION

You’d swear that the whole deal came straight out of a movie by Fellini. With his sky-blue costume, his round belly, his pear-shaped head, he is one of the XX^th Century’s greatest clowns. But in the world of motion pictures, Godard is the Director who hired Raymond Devos in 1965, in a memorable scene from Pierrot le Fou (Pierrot the Fool) where he played… the fool! An entire generation knew him on television as a loyal guest of the French Pop Music TV Show, Le Grand Échiquier (The Great Chessboard). A real juggler with words, he had no equal for deceiving his audiences, seized by laughter and emotion, because he also had an impact on their emotional sensitivity with his violin, his piston, his bandoneon. Mime, actor, musician, acrobat, he began his career in the cabarets in Paris’ Left Bank, before graduating to large music halls. But above all, Devos had a sense of humor that came from his devouring love for words.

« The true sage hardly believes in his own wisdom, whereas the true loony believes in his own madness. » This sentence, taken from his book “Rêvons de mots” (Let’s Dream of Words) seems to define Raymond Devos himself. Even when he might occasionally seem to be very wise, the next second, thanks to a verbal pirouette, he makes it quite clear to everyone that this is definitely not the case. As for being a real fool, no one has ever doubted it. At the time of the 100^th anniversary of his birth, it occurred to me that I owed Raymond Devos a show comparable to the one I had staged about Pierre Desproges. So, I asked many actor friends to join me, and to my great joy and satisfaction, each time they were available, they all agreed to do so. Depending on their schedules, at least six of them will be on stage every evening, to tell you the crazy story of the one who loved being “a real veal chop”. I hope that you will be just as delighted as we have been with this tribute paid to the great Raymond Devos.

Daniel Benoin

Texts by Raymond Devos

• Re-written by Daniel Benoin
• Video Paulo Correia
• DBP Coproduction – Anthéa, Antibes Theater

WITH SIX ACTORS AMONG THE FOLLOWING GROUP:

• Christophe Alévêque
• Daniel Benoin
• François Berléand
• Michel Boujenah
• Patrick Chesnais
• François-Xavier Demaison
• Mélanie Doutey
• Hippolyte Girardot
• Stéphane Guillon
• Gérard Jugnot
• Arthur Jugnot
• Mathilda May
• Sylvie Testud

EN TOURNÉE

BOOKING

Sophie Hossenlopp
sophie.hossenlopp@visiteursdusoir.com