Raymond Devos

Walloon origins

French of nationality, but native of Mouscron. He was born in an elegant white castle, the castle of the Turrets. His/her parents, at the time, were fortunate. Louis Devos, the father, had launched out in the industry of the textile. Raymond Devos had inherited his mother a great part of his artistic talents. Agnès Devos adored to make word games and she also played of the violin and the mandoline. Devos had initially six boys, from which one will disappear a few months after its birth. Their seventh child was, finally, a girl. Cécile Devos is 78 years old today.

Devos had chosen Mouscron to give birth to there their small Raymond. Less than two years later, for tax reasons, the family resold the castle of the Turrets and settled just on the other side of the border, in Tourcoing. But they often returned to Belgium. Raymond Devos told his memories of childhood: “If I dreamed to make theater, it is because my father took us along to the circus to Mouscron. I was fascinated. With my brothers, we had traced a track of circus in the workshop of our father. ”

One outstanding time which remade surface in 1956 at the time of the course of sound one man show which brought back it to Mouscron. It is at the head put to find this native castle about which its mom had so often spoken to him. In its memory, it was an immense castle. It started with what Mouscron had of more imposing, the castle of the Counts of which the frontage did not point out anything to him. Somebody suggested to him going to see the Turrets. There, it was at his place…

Eternal student

With his/her father, Louis, Certified public accountant, Frontier worker , originating in Tourcoing and its mother Agnes, it leaves at the two years age the Belgium for the France, located at five kilometers of its birthplace. He very early discovers his gift to tell stories and especially to captivate his audience. Raise with the Free Institution of the Sacred Heart to Tourcoing, it must stop its studies at 13 years because of the serious financial problems which its family knows, without being able to appease its thirst for knowledge. That will remain like its greater regret and this posture of studied eternal, fascinated by the knowledge will give him.

It is thus by itself that it perfect its culture and its control of the French language and the Musique. Its family universe predisposes it to juggle with the music. His/her father plays of the Orgue and the Piano, his mother of the Violon and the Mandoline, his uncle of the Clarinette. He will learn itself from the instruments as various as the clarinet, the piano, the Harpe, the Guitare, the Bandonéon, the trumpet, the Musical saw…

The bankruptcy of the company of his/her father the constrained one of going in Parisian suburbs, where its family will live under difficult conditions. With all its will and its eagerness to become artist, it observes with rapture the spectacles of street, like those of the Forain S, Place of the Bastille: “They withdrew the Cadenas which connected their material with length of year and they left the carpet, the weight, instruments for haranguer crowd: Mesdames Attention and Sirs, the spectacle will start. ”

While waiting to be an artist, he exerts various trades, in particular: dispach rider in the tri-car, Bookseller, dairyman with the Markets, where it must reflect eggs… But the war arrives at great step and Raymond Devos is required by the Service of obligatory work (STO). He keeps the moral one by proposing spectacles with his companions (of misfortune) thanks to the instruments (of fortune) which he could carry with him. “When I was off-set work in Germany, I côtoyais men of different nationalities daily. With rudiments of language German E, one tried to be rendered comprehensible. But there were also the gestures, an attitude, a glance which added to the relational efforts. ” It thus enriches its luggage by a new experiment, that of MIME, which it will perfect at the school of Etienne Decroux, where it meets Marcel Marceau.

“Dismounted sea”

It takes then courses of Théâtre near Tania Balachova and of Henri Rollan, whose course of dramatic art is held with the Théâtre of the Old man-Dovecote. He plays in the Doctor in spite of him and Knock . Boarder of the company Jacques Fabbri, one sees it in the virtue in danger , the hussards , the phantoms , the family of Harlequin .

In 1948, it assembles a burlesque number “the three cousins”, with André Gille and Georges Denis. The three partners occur with the club of the Old man-Dovecote and the Red rose. A duet with Roger Verbecke succeeds the trio then: “The finches” occur with the ABC and the Three-Donkeys by singing comic parodies of songs of cow-boy.

But it is randomly of a theater tour of the casinos cities with the company Jacques Fabbri, with Biarritz, which he discovers the absurdity and the comedy situation. Questioning a Master of hotel, “I would like to see the sea”, it sees myself answering “do not think You of it, it is dismounted”. “When it be gone up will? ” he insists. “It is a matter of time”… These four counterparts give him the matter with a sketch, the sea , then soon with another, the bus for Caen , and finally with a style become inimitable.

It is with the cabaret “the horse of gold”, initially, then with “the lock” and the “Three-donkeys” which it tests its first sketches and the character who went, with the wire of time, to impress the public. Noticed by Maurice Knight, it will pass in first part of its spectacle to Alhambra and gains the dedication there. Its sketch prohibited Sens makes it famous: “But say to me dairy, your milk will turn! ”, apostrophizes to which the slag in question, taken on a roundabout giving only on prohibited directions, answers by “You do not make any, I make my butter”.

Juggler of words

Accompanied by its faithful pianist and partner, Herve Guido, it consequently multiplies the appearances in the theaters and soon largest (Bobino, Olympia) tear off it. Its spectacle grows rich unceasingly: MIME, actor, musician, juggler, equilibrist on monocycle, conjurer… He juggles as well with small balls as with balls of five kilograms. Its physical prowesses on scene cause the astonishment then the laughter, compared to its rebounded silhouette, with its pants retained under the belly by straps. And its mimicry punctuates gestural exceptional admirably. Raymond Devos will triumph thereafter over the small screen, regularly invited by Jacques Chancel in his Grand Chess-board .

Very different from a Coluche in spite of a reference common to the clown, contemporary of Fernand Raynaud, which shares with him its passion of the MIME, the humor of Raymond Devos plank often the Métaphysique (Friedrich Nietzsche), even the mathematical fundamental, as when he explains why “three times Nothing, it is already something”. Much regards it as a genius of the words, a poet hurluberlu and astonishing. Its literary references are Gaston Bachelard and Marcel Aymé. Its inspirers and models are Tristan Bernard, Alphonse Allais, Alfred Jarry, Boris Vian with which Devos worked, Raymond Queneau. Without forgetting Charlie Chaplin, Jacques Tati, Pierre Etaix and large clowns like legendary the Footit and Chocolat, Grock, the Fratellini or Pipo.

He married the April 30th 1959 with Simone Beguin. The couple did not have children.

Victim of a Brain attack in December 2005, hospitalized again beginning February 2006 for the same reason with the Hospital of Pity-Salpêtrière to Paris, it dies at his place, with 7:50, the June 15th 2006 of the continuations of a crisis of acute edema of the lung, surrounded by his/her Cécile sister, her two nephews Jean-Louis and Stephan, and of his private secretary Pierre Herran. Its funeral takes place the June 19th in the church of Saint-Rémy-the-Chevreuse.

French or Belgian?

Its Dutch name means “the bizzare”. But however, not of doubt: his/her father, born with Tourcoing in 1887, his/her grandfather, born with Bousbecque, in 1841, his/her mother, Breton of Glazed, are French. With his birth with Mouscron, in Belgium, with two steps of the Border with the France, his/her father declared it with the communal Maison of this city, where his/her parents had a property then, the castle of Turrets. But it omitted to also register it with the consulate of France. In spite of identity papers in due form, its basic situation was never regularized. In 2002, questioning on this subject the service charged with the French abroad born, with Nantes, it is lived to answer: “There is no Mr. Devos on our shelves… ”. Raymond Devos will translate this ambiguity with humor: “I was born with a foot in Belgium and a foot in France, therefore I walk the isolated feet. ”

Quotations

Devos Website http://www.raymonddevos.com/

When one with the claim, like me to involve people in the imaginary one, it is necessary to be able to bring back them in reality, then… and without damage!! '

“ The laughter is a serious thing with which one does not need plaisanter. ”

“ The reason of most insane is always the meilleure. ” ( Extracts from the spectacle Upside down)

“ Even with God, one should not try Diable ! ” ( the upward fall )

“ It sometimes happened to me to lend the ear to a deaf person… He did not hear mieux ! ”

To speak anything to say

“ Nothing, it is rien ! The proof, it is that one can withdraw it. Exemple : nothing minus nothing equalizes less than rien ! ”

“ Once nothing, it is rien ; twice nothing, it is beaucoup ; but for three times nothing, one can already buy something, and for step cher. ”

“ Me, when I do not have anything to say, I want that one it sache. ”

“ Notice, if love is made, it is to satisfy the directions. And it is for the gasoline that the guerre is made;!

- People prefer to slip their skin under cloths for the pleasure of the directions that to risk it under the flags for the price of the essence. ” ( Made love, not the war )

“ My right foot is jealous of my left foot. When one advances, the other wants to exceed it. And me, like an imbecile, I marche ! ”

“ But why does if run vite ?

- To gain temps ! As time is money… The more quickly they run, the more they in gagnent ! ” ( Where does run ? )

“ Dear Sir, which I admire in you, it is that you have courage to be you-même ; with all that comprises of ridicule ! ” ( the direction of ridiculous the )

“ When I am wrong, I have my reasons, that I do not give. It would be to recognize my torts ! ” ( Wrongly or rightly )

“ One is always wrong to try to be right in front of people who have all the good reasons to believe that they do not have tort ! ” ( Wrongly or rightly )

“ The stories which you tell do not prevent of dormir ?

- If, but as they are cock-and-bull stories, I récupère ! ” ( wind of revolt )

“ I have a friend who is xenophobe. He hates such point abroad that when he goes in their country, he cannot supporter ! ” ( Xenophobia )

“ If my wife must be widowed one day, I would like better than it is of my vivant. ” ( Extracts from the spectacle Upside down)

“ I believe in immortality, and yet I fear well to die before connaître. ”

“ When one knew oneself, my wife and me, one was so timid both that one did not dare to look at oneself. Now, voir. any more cannot; ” ( My wife )

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