Posted By: GenealogyBuff.com Date: Sunday, 21 July 2024, at 6:47 p.m.
Marcel Marceau, Master Mime
Marcel Marceau - On September 22, 2007, Nicolas Sarkozy, the President of the French Republic said, “France loses one of its most eminent ambassadors.” He wasn’t offering his condolences at the death of a poet, a chef, a painter or a designer. Sarkozy was speaking of the death of perhaps the greatest mime to don black and white stripes. Marcel Marceau, mime extraordinaire.
Beginning in 1946, until his retirement in 2005, Marceau performed as the character "Bip", a powdered white-faced mime who, in addition to the classic shtick of miming—fighting against an invisible wind, being trapped inside an invisible box—offered interpretations of more metaphysical concepts.
In “Creation, ” he pantomimed the emergence of life on earth with fluttering hands and waving arms that culminated with the birth of Adam and Eve. In “Youth, Maturity, Old Age and Death, ” Marceau enacted a whole life cycle in under four minutes. These were oddly alluring and ambitious pieces that expressed entire ranges of emotions in fluid succession.
Marceau was a master of the joyful and tragic expression of humanity using only the medium of the body and face. His dedication to the purity of his craft and his passion for relaying its power through tireless international tours will be the hallmark of his singularity.
