Behind the silent man with white make-up … is a back-story that speaks volumes, after the jump …
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Just over ten years ago, the world lost its most iconic mime, Marcel Marceau— whose “art of silence”, brought to life by Bip the Clown— entertained the world for sixty years (in part, because there was no language barrier to overcome.) Yet his back-story — which regular readers know is often more fascinating to me — is less well-known (indeed, I knew nothing about it until reading his obituary). It is worth recalling, lo these many years later … and with a new film in the works.
He was born Marcel Mangel in the city of Strasbourg in 1923, the son of Jewish parents from Poland and (present-day) Ukraine. At age five he saw a Charlie Chaplin film, which was his inspiration for a career in entertainment. When the Nazis invaded France in 1940, his family moved to the city of Limoges, then to other places, always-on-the-run. He began entertaining other Jewish children with mime, encouraging them to stay silent as they made their way to the Swiss border. At age seventeen, he joined the French Resistance and entered a theater school two months before the liberation of Paris in 1944 — and impressed the instructor with his ability to mime. When asked his name, he replied Marcel Marceau — taking his new last name from a French Revolutionary War general. He lost his father (who was taken to Auschwitz), though his mother survived the war.
His first major performance was in front of 3,000 American troops following the liberation of Paris. He joined the Free French Army and due to his tri-lingual skills (French, German and English) served as a translator for the US Army as a liaison officer for General George Patton. After the war (upon finishing his own drama classes) he went on to found his own school of mime in 1949 and decades later in the USA: opened the Marceau Foundation to teach mime.
He created Bip the Clown in 1947, modeled (as many suspected) after his childhood hero, Charlie Chaplin …. but also (not as well-known) after Stan Laurel, whom he saw as someone who incorporated mime even in talking pictures (plus Buster Keaton and Mack Sennett, to a lesser degree, as well as ancient theater).
Bip the Clown: lasting imageHis break-through in the USA came in 1955-56, when he performed to standing room-only crowds nationwide. And of his many, many sketches: perhaps his most famous is one he created in the 1950’s (which one NPR analyst recalled from school days) entitled Youth, Maturity, Old Age and Death— the cycle of life in around three minutes. This video is not very clear (especially when the lights are low) … but it became a signature piece of his.
x xYouTube VideoHe became a regular on television around the world and warned those who were to interview him, "Never get a mime talking .... he won't stop." He appeared as a guest in several films, with a notable speaking role with Jane Fonda in the 1968 film Barbarella. He wrote two children’s books, plus collections of lithographs he took, won an Emmy in the USA and has been an influence on performers and troupes such as Cirque du Soleil. And he received numerous honors around the world, someone recognizable anywhere.
One entertainer in the US who took to him in a big way was ….. Michael Jackson, who was friends with Marceau for over twenty years and many believe that his “Moonwalk” dance was (at least partially) inspired by a Marceau sketch entitled Walking Against the Wind.
Marceau’s final world tours occurred from 2004-2005 before his death in September, 2007 at the age of 84. Among the music played at his funeral was a piece he often used in his performances (Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21) and he is buried at the world-famous Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.
Out of costume … in 1962In 2014, a memoir was written by an artist about her relationship with him, last year a biography of Marceau was published — and there is now a biopic film in production entitled Resistance— with Jesse Eisenberg in the title role — focusing on Marceau’s role during the wartime resistance.
Let’s close with the only spoken word in the 1976 Mel Brooks film Silent Movie— where a printed (on-screen) question is asked : “Mr. Marceau, how would you like to appear in the first silent movie made in nearly fifty years?”
x xYouTube VideoNow, on to Top Comments:
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And lastly: yesterday's Top Mojo - mega-mojo to the intrepid mik ...... who rescued this feature from oblivion:
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