Chunnel Vision

Balsa wood faces - plus a few interlopers from "I Robot"

[français en bas]

IT SEEMS AN UNLIKELY PLACE to find a temple to a vanishing art form. Mais le voilà… tucked away in a charmless ’70s concrete development near the quartier Saint-Blaise, the Théâtre aux Mains Nues is just that.

Welcome to the only school in Paris devoted to the art of marionette performance.

Students come from across France to study the traditional art of puppetry here, working at first with blank-faced marionettes, all the better to fine-tune their mastery of expression and manipulation.

Regular children’s shows are, of course, calculated to have tots saucer-eyed. But theatre director, Eloi Recoing stresses that this is an art form that lends itself readily to grown-up subjects – even suicide, the theme of a recent collaboration with teenagers.

Some with carved balsa-wood features, others with latex faces and “I, Robot” eyes, almost all the puppets here are “marionettes à gaine”.

Eloi Recoing and 'Violetta'

Technically, they are  ”glove puppets”, but I blush to call them that. It hardly  seems worthy of the three-foot-high beauty who languidly “sang” her way through a recent version of La Traviata.

This Violetta, like all of the 400 marionettes in the theatre’s possession, is a one-hit-wonder. Every performance at the theatre relies on a cast of characters commissioned entirely from scratch.

Recoign scripted his first major marionette performance at the age of 21 – “a great moment”, he recalls, glancing at the poster on the wall. He takes care of writing and directing most of the theatre’s repertoire.

So who are the performances for?

“I hate carving up audiences,” he says. “What’s important is that parents step over the threshold and get to discover this wonderful art form for themselves.”

• Again Festival, 3rd-18th October: le Théâtre aux Mains Nues, 7 square des Cardeurs, 20th arrondissement, Paris.

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A PREMIERE VUE, l’endroit n’est pas prometteur, mais non, je ne me suis pas trompée d’adresse. Ici, dans une petite jungle bétonnée des années 70 se trouve le temple d’une vieille tradition artistique de France. Bienvenue au Théâtre des Mains Nues, une des seules écoles rescapées dédiée aux arts de la marionnette.

chaque distribution créée pour une seule mise-en-scène

Issus des conservatoires ou simples débutants, ils viennent de loin pour étudier ici. Les apprentis travaillent avec des marionnettes à visage neutre pour maîtriser la manipulation et l’expression.

Les spectacles réguliers sont calculés, bien sûr, à ensorceler un jeune public. Mais pour le directeur du théâtre, Eloi Recoing, c’est un art qui se prête naturellement aux préoccupations d’adultes, voire tabous, telles que le suicide, thème d’une collaboration avec des adolescents parisiens.

Avec leurs visages en bois de balsa ou enrobée de latex blanc (qui fait penser à l’anti-héros du film, I Robot), les marionnettes ici sont “à gaine”.

En anglais, on les appelle “glove puppets” (marionnettes à gant) Le terme semble un peu rustique pour désigner la grande diva pâle qui a joué la Traviata il n’y a pas longtemps.

Cette Violetta (image en haut à droite) a déjà achevé sa carrière car, comme toutes les marionnettes de la distribution, elle a éte créée uniquement pour cette mise-en-scène. Le théâtre a donc amassé une collection d’environ 400 marionnettes, la grande majorité stockée en province.

Eloi Recoing a écrit son premier grand scénario à marionnettes à l’âge de 21 ans – “un grand moment,” se souvient-il, en désignant l’affiche sur le mur. C’est lui qui écrit les textes à ce jour. Et ses spectateurs? “Je n’aime pas séparer les publics,” répond-il. “Ce qui est important, c’est que les parents osent venir découvrir cet art magnifique.”

• Again Festival, 3 au 18 octobre: le Théâtre aux Mains Nues, 7 square des Cardeurs, Paris 20e.

[français en bas]

IT SEEMED as though the cream of Parisian youth was at Porte de Champerret, Paris 17th this weekend for Paris-Manga, an event that draws around 32,000 visitors in its two-day run.

Comics, cartoons, graphic novels – call ‘em what you will – the French can’t get enough of la bande dessinée (BD for short). Here, the genre is claimed as the Ninth Art (alas, narrowly missing out to that other gallic passion, cinematography). And, among the younger consumers, manga is mainstream. It accounts for more than 40% of all BDs now purchased in France.

For the first time this year, Paris-Manga went broad church, embracing sci-fi and comics. Dan Prowse, aka Dark (sic) Vador, was on hand to sign his autobiography, along with a small army of artists, from young hopefuls turning out drawings at a few euros a throw, to Mike Ploog, of ’70s Marvel Comics fame.

Intrigued to know how anyone breaks into Marvel and DC Comics, I touched down with James Hodgkins, a British graphic artist who works as an ‘inker’ on Batman and Spiderman comics.

Hodgkins (pictured below, far right) has encouragement for young people who want to work in the industry. “It’s not a closed shop or an old boy’s network,” he says. “There are structures in place, and publishers like Marvel are always on the lookout for the next big talent. Come to the conventions, meet the artists. And be prepared for hard work, I mean, not real work, but a lot of hours, seven days a week.”

Hodgkins turns out to be a big fan of French BD artists, partly because they’re less plot-driven. His hero is Moebius, the creator of the enigmatic Blueberry Westerns: “He’s a genius, when you meet him, you know you’re in the presence of someone special.” Hodgkins’ own solo graphic novel, Civilians Nil (he describes it as “an existential crime thriller”) is due for publication in the UK and France next year.

Exuberant, chaotic and good-natured, Paris-Manga returns in February 2010. Where else can you see samurai, Rose Maidens, wizards and storm troopers brushing shoulders and making mass hugs?

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IL SEMBLAIT que toute la jeunesse Parisienne était à l’espace Champerret, Paris 17e ce weekend pour Paris-Manga, un salon qui attire aux alentours de 32.000 visiteurs pendant deux jours.

Les passionnés de mangas étaient là en force, bien évidemment, parce que les mangas représent actuellement plus de 40 % des ventes en France. Pour la première fois cette année, Paris-Manga englobait également la science fiction et la BD américaine. Dan Prowse (Dark Vador dans les films de George Lucas) était là pour dédicacer son autobiographie, ainsi qu’une petite armée d’artistes, qui allait de jeunes talents fournissant des dessins pour quelques euros, à Mike Ploog, célèbre graphiste à Marvel Comics pendant les années 1970.

Quel espoir pour les jeunes qui aspirent un jour d’être à sa place? James Hodgkins, un graphiste anglais qui travaille comme “inker” sur les BD Spiderman et Batman, les encourage. ¨Ce n’est pas un un réseau secret ou fermé,” dit-il.

“Il y a des structures en place pour recruter et les maisons d’édition sont toujours à la recherche du nouveau grand talent. Soyez prêts à travailler dur – admettons, c’est pas vraiment travail, vous savez – mais de longues heures, sept jours sur sept.”

Il s’avère que Hodgkins est un grand admirateur de la BD française et il constate qu’elle est moins dictée par une narrative. Moebius, le créateur de Blueberry est son héros: “C’est un génie, quand on le rencontre, on reconnaît qu’on est en face de quelqu’un exceptionnel.” Le premier livre solo de Hodgkins, Civilians Nil (selon lui un roman policier “existentiel”), devrait paraître en France l’an prochain.

Exubérant, un brin chaotique et dans un univers qui se tient à part, Paris-Manga revient en février 2010. Et s’il y a une autre évènement où les samourai, les Rose-Maidens, les sorcières et les stormtroopers peuvent se cotoyer et même participer dans un “hug” collectif, ben, moi, je ne sais pas où c’est.

PAPER PLATES are piled with bread and fromage de tete and rillettes and Bleu d’Auvergne. Half barrels stand ready for trampling the grapes, plucked this very morning by ‘young ladies on ladders’. Any woman under 50 automatically qualifies as a ‘young lady’ to Jacques Mélac, a thoroughgoing gallant.

Mélac is the man responsible for bringing la France Profonde to the 11th arrondissement for one day a year.

Around two hundred punters and a Zouave with a mike have turned up to share the moment.  Genial under his handlebar moustache, Mélac hovers behind the scenes to ensure all goes well.

30 years of Château Charonne

No surprise to learn that it all started out as a bit of a lark.

Mélac originally planted the vine (a cutting from his native Aveyron) out of frustration with the arcane civic rules governing Parisian shop signs.

To everyone’s surprise, it thrived and kept on growing. When, 30 years ago, a passing journalist asked jokingly when the vendange was, Mélac rose to the challenge.

Since then, the event, like the vine, has gone from strength to strength. Traffic is turned away. Out come the trestle tables, the band strikes up, and last year’s Château Charonne is raffled off in a tombola.

The time according to Bacchus

Other prizes are decidedly offbeat, designed to present the winner with a headache unless he or she is prepared to share it around. The formula keeps people coming, all the way from metro Wagram to the Windy City. “It’s really an excuse for a knees-up,” says Mélac.

He has a point. For one day in September, conviviality is guaranteed in the 11th arrondissement.

Replete and contented, I pocket my ticket and slope off before the big draw. What if I won? Here’s hoping they give the hog a good home and donate my gross of socks to a sanctuary for footsore donkeys…

• Bistrot Mélac, 42, rue Léon-Frot, 11th arrondissement.
• Annual vendange in September from 11.30 am to around 4pm. Assiettes de charcuterie or fromage at 8 euros apiece, wine from 2 euros the glass.

THE GUEST LIST for my imaginary dinner party of Famous Frogs Through The Ages changes by the week.

But one name that’s firmly on the list is that of Alexandre Dumas… wit, bon vivant, gourmet, intrepid traveller and writer of industrial output. Who better to make a soiréee go with a swing?

Dumas père’s novels include The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo, La Reine Margot, The Black Tulip and dozens more blockbusters you’ll never get round to reading. Flamboyant through and through, Dumas spent his fortune as fast as he made it. Much of it went on the Chateau de Monte Cristo, the fantasy home and party pad he built in the 1840s when he was at the height of his fame.

Saved from destruction in 1997, the Chateau de Monte Cristo is a startling confection.The interior has been restored to reflect a man who lived life to the full (witness the bedazzling Moorish suite he installed after his travels in the southern Med.)  In the gardens, guarded by a snoozing stone dog, is the Chateau d’If (pictured below), Dumas’ miniature gothic retreat. As creative dens go, it beats the garden shed.

Dumas was ‘mulatto’, descendent of a freed Haitian slave – which gives him some claim to have been France’s first black writer. And it’s a measure of the man that he claimed his greatest work was actually his illegitimate son, Alexandre Jr, who is rather less well remembered today as the author of The Lady of the Camelias.

Tempted to visit? The Chateau de Monte Cristo is in Marly le Roi, some 15 kilometres west of Paris, or a 30 minute train ride from Gare St-Lazare. From Marly le Roi station, take bus number 10 to bus-stop Les Lampes, and follow the signs. If it’s sunny, round the day off with a picnic at the Parc du Marly.

Now, who shall I put next to Colette…?