HIS ONE-MAN show has left audiences spellbound and critics reaching for superlatives. Last night The Irish Timeswas allowed to photograph a live performance in the Abbey Theatre of Raoul by French performer James Thiérrée.
Thiérrée’s shows have been a sell-out. He is pleased with the response of Irish audiences, whereas in New York, the audience and critics cannot decide if he “is too French or not French enough”.
“What I like about Irish audiences is the black humour that I can feel right away. They appreciate the darkness and the humour,” he says.
“They appreciate the mix of the two.”
Raoul is about a man who finds himself alone in the world and everything that he thinks is real turns out to be something else.
Even after conjuring this fantasy world, the cold reality of what is happening outside the walls of the Abbey Theatre keeps breaking through.
Thiérrée says it is difficult to sleep after the show, so he has become engrossed in Irish news and late-night debate shows. “The story of this man losing his walls and the wall is crumbling is like the Irish situation with the housing crash. The symbolism is similar.”
Thiérrée’s warm-up routine takes longer than the show itself and the physical demands means he cannot do a straight run night after night. He has been an acrobat since he was 10 but says that being 30 (he is 36) makes him an “old man” in the acrobatic world.
“I feel exhilarated by the exhaustion. I have never done a show that does not take me to exhaustion. It is challenging and tough, but I’m not a martyr of my creation.”
He is a grandson of Charlie Chaplin, and looks like him too, although he is understandably reluctant to talk about it. “I’m interested in the relationship with the audience and what is happening tonight and never again. Every night is an event. That is what is interesting more than the biography of the branch.”
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