“The public wants to see people in failure on stage”
Agnès Hurstel, stand-up artist, author and performer of the “Jeune et Golri” series (on OCS, from September 2).
“I don’t reason in terms of benevolence, on the other hand, I have trouble with the pure cynicism, which can sometimes be found in Louis CK. I prefer Mike Birbiglia, especially his show Thank God for Jokes (on Netflix) where he recounts the attack on Charlie hebdo and wonders how far we can make humor. I don’t think we can’t say anything more today. As long as my eye is frizzy, I can go very far. Fortunately, we pay much more attention to minorities, that we no longer make racist jokes, that we do not say “dirty bitch” for free. If you do, it’s because you’re playing a big pig and in the next joke you’re going to settle his score.
When I started in the comedy clubs, I went on stage in a very aggressive way, to make a place for myself. When I caught someone in the audience talking, I would say to them: “Shut up, this is not a dialogue!” It made people laugh but I don’t think it was a smart laugh. It was a first layer laugh, not an identifying laugh. Little by little, I understood that I shouldn’t make fun of others but of myself – or of my fictional double. The public wants to see people in failure on stage: it is catharsis. You are going to see Medea who kills her children so as not to kill yours in life. “
“The only freedom left is the stage and the books”
Laurent Baffie, PAF sniper, author of “Guide de la repartie” (ed. Kero, in bookstores on October 27, 304 p., € 15.90), on tour in “Laurent Baffie asks himself questions”.
“When I was a kid, I walked past the butcher’s shop telling my mate the meat wasn’t fresh and the butcher would run up my ass: ‘What do you mean the meat isn’t fresh?’ Is it malicious? I do not believe. I’m a Parisian titi, I have 63 brushes, it’s another culture, it’s another era. I spend my life making jokes, it’s a healthy lifestyle.
I made my television debut in the Jean Yanne show, Everyone is nice on La Cinq, in 1989. We allowed ourselves things that would not work today. For example, alpaca passers-by with this: “We made a cottage cheese so soft that if you put your head in it you will be able to stay in apnea much longer.” Then I stuck their heads in the cheese and then in a basin of water and I swung: “You are going to give Jean Moulin the bill.” It is there that I made myself an image of villain, with which I lived very well. I never showed the nice moments – after the hoax was revealed, we were going to drink shots together – I would have found that condescending.
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