Portraits -
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First aired on Super Écran: January 2006

Transcript of the English subtitles on the broadcast << notes by viv>>

<< Roy is confronted by an old photograph of a town, the skyline dominated by the dome of a cathedral>>  You found that?  The “Mamelle gelée” <<the Frozen Udder>>.  That is how we used to call Amos city because of its cathedral.  I was born in – how do we call it again – New Liskeard, on the opposite side of the Temiscamingue Lake.  I lived there for 3 months, and then my father got transferred to Amos.  He was a sales representative.  So I spent my whole childhood in Amos, and then we moved to the North of Ontario. 

I was the kind of kid, and I am still a bit like this, who never wanted to go to bed, that is for sure.  It was hard to get me to sleep … I was afraid to miss something.  It was a little death for me.  It’s like: one day is over.  It has to end.  Finishing things, I don’t know … I also think it is mainly …  is there anything else to do today?  What I really liked when I was young were the weekends.  Friday and Saturday nights, I could, I did not have to go to bed early.  And my mother was watching movies till late at night, so she also could go to sleep late.  Since I was very little, I remember watching movies with my mom until 3am until the TV channel shut down. 

<<Another photo>> That was my church, my parish where I was serving mass.   Probably one of my first roles – the first costume that I wore.  The first costume I think I got, in fact it was not a costume, it was a trench coat that my great-aunt, who was living beside the cathedral, right up the slope here.  There was still a small hill.  My great-aunt gave me that kind of trench coat – Colombo style.  I think I was in first grade.  At that point I started to sort of lay down the law at school, but only when I was wearing my trench coat.  Of course, costumes and accessories inspire me, or stimulate my imagination, my imagery.  But as well as most of the kids too.  I remember that at National Theatre School, during the first years, they did not give us any accessories nor any costumes, and that was … we had to mime.  If there was a phone on the table we had to mime it.  I always hated mime since then. 

The fact that I ended up in the National Theatre School started with the day when my mom woke me up.  I think it was a Wednesday.  I don’t know why it comes back to me, but on a Wednesday morning she told me: We are leaving.  “We are leaving” meant that we had to run away from Dad.  My dad was a sales representative, there was one day per week when he was sleeping elsewhere, that is why I remember it was on a Wednesday.  It was on a Wednesday.  And we spent that day choosing and packing half the house.  Choosing the furniture.  Do we take the washer and dryer or the stove and refrigerator?  To leave him half.  It was … finally, it started with a very violent gesture.  At one point I had to put my bicycle in the truck, and then I decided to go for a last bicycle ride in my neighbourhood.  I ended up in the back of my school, and suddenly, once I was alone, I saw my father who, after 16 years of marriage, after 14 years that I knew him, of my relationship with him, he was getting in the house and we were gone.  Yes, I saw him.  I put myself in his shoes.  It is weird because this is often what an actor does.  It is actually what we do most of the time, putting ourselves in someone else’s shoes.  To understand them, to feel what they are feeling and live what they are living. <<long pause>> And that was violent.

Even if we do not see each other often, family is important.  It is something  <<long pause>>   How could I say?  I only have one brother, I only have one sister and only one mother. <<long pause>> We lived together for a long time.  I mean, in a sense, we experienced some fairly intense situations. 

If my mother had not woken me up, with that sentence on that particular morning, I would never have become an actor, of this I am pretty sure.  It was too inaccessible to become an actor and it never crossed my mind.  Even when I arrived in Laval, I remember that in secondary III they organized a play at a certain point and they wanted me to act in it.  I did not understand why.  And I didn’t do it either. 

But the fact that I am an actor now, that it aimed towards that direction, is that I was studying science and I went to see Molière by Ariane Mnouchkine.  And it is definitely about a comedian.  This is not only the story of an author, but also that of a comedian.  The day after, I quit my physics course and ended up in a French theatre course.  There was an oral presentation to do, and my friend and I were not prepared.  We were separated in teams of two and my friend and I were a team.  So we went downstairs at my place and then I said, “Look.”  My friend had already started to work on a biography of Molière.  I said, “Listen, you are going to begin by reading Molière’s biography, and you’re going to say , ‘This is what Molière wrote, but Molière, above all, was an actor’.  So then I will come into the classroom.”  And I remembered almost all of Le balayeur de nuit <<The Night Sweeper>> by heart, which is a Commedia dell’Arte sketch played by Molière in the movie, and I played it right in his face.  He was like <<makes a gaping face>> … I had my mom’s hat, moccasins, I went to get a broom, a paper mask, because he had one.  And I did it and he was astonished.  We then played it in class.  The teacher was a Frenchman, and he was also astonished; the whole class was.  I think it was a week later, they came to me and said, “Listen Roy, we would like to play Le malade imaginaire <<The Hypochondriac (UK)/The Imaginary Invalid (US)>> by Molière, and we would like you to play the sick man”.  I told them, “You’re sick!”  <<laughs>>

I met Michelle Labonté who played Toinette.  Her sisters were a bit in the theatrical field, and she had decided a long time ago that she would go to the National Theatre School.  Not any school -  the National Theatre School.  She did not want to go to the Conservatory, she wanted the National Theatre School.  I remember that.  So a few months later, she called me and asked me if I wanted to play opposite her for the National Theatre School auditions.  And I said yes.  So we worked with Murielle Dutil.  She had chosen a scene from Le malade imaginaire  and one from Le temps d’une paix << A Time of Peace>> I think it was.   Le temps d’une vie! <<In a Lifetime – 1973 play by Roland Lepage>>  Sorry, Le temps d’une paix is something else << an ‘80s Quebec TV series about the period between the two World Wars>>.  Two days before the auditions, it was my birthday.  She came to my party and gave me an envelope with a ribbon on it.  In the envelope there was the questionnaire you have to fill up when you are enlisting in the National Theatre School auditions.  Because one of her friends was registered and decided not to go, so she told me, “If you want to go you could pretend you’re him.”   I was in college then.  I did not have the requirements to continue in sciences any more, so I was in Psychology.  I did not know what to do any more.  I used to smoke hash and play chess – that is about all I was doing at that time.  I really had nothing to lose.  I didn’t even know if I really wanted to, but that school looked like something.  So that’s it!  I went to the school for the auditions, and my name was Stéphane Labelle.  We played our scenes, in front of Michelle Rossignol, the school director.  After the scenes Michelle was looking at me, then at the table – Michelle Rossignol – and after a while she said, “That’s not you.”   I said, “What?”  She said, “This.”  I bent over the table.  Of course it was Stéphane Labelle’s picture.  I knew him.  He had this curly black hair, and it was his graduation picture, with the little pompom.  I found that very funny.  I was laughing.  I was like … Anyway, I was there for Michelle Labonté , so I said, “Oh no, sorry, it is not me.”  She said, “You are not allowed to do this.”  I said that I knew that.  She went on asking questions like, “Why didn’t you register?”  “It is too expensive.  This is a private school.”  “Would you like to attend?”  Finally, she gave me a registration form.  She then told me, “Fill that up, put your picture on it, and if you ever get to the training course, never mention this to anyone.”

I am not really a shy person but I don’t like to be on stage.  When I was playing the cello, every Christmas my mother, when guests were arriving, would argue with me to get me to play.  Sometimes it took a long time before I finally decided to play.  <<approaches cello and plucks it>>  It is even tuned up.  I compare the actor’s body to an instrument.  That does not come from me; I think I heard it at the National Theatre School.  That we actors are instruments.  For me it is quite simple; it is the instrument that acts.  In that sense, the body is an instrument, yes.  And I think that the more you have lived, the more you can understand.  I am introverted.  Yes.  That is something I learned in psychoanalysis.  I have done like seven years of psychoanalysis, on and off.  From what I know, from what I have learned, there are two types of people: those who are introverted and those who are extroverted.  There are many kinds of introverted people.  But basically, the introverted are people that come to people in an introverted manner.  They are often … slower people, who like to think before they talk.  Who need to.  Or rather, who have a hard time talking just for the sake of it.  So they are people who feel uneasy on stage.  As for me, it is clear … when I play a character I do not go on stage.  The character goes on stage.  It is the character who goes in front of the camera, not me.  As of now, I don’t think I have ever played a character I did not understand.  I think that it is Hugo who once said, “Understand to forgive.”  It’s a bit like that.  You are able to forgive when you understand the characters, even if they are the worst crooks ever.   There is often a reason; there is often a motivation that allows you to assume it, to understand it.  And I am not that kind of actor who will draw from his own life.  My life already follows me.  Life is so important to me.  It is really all I have.  And I only have one.  I am not completely sure of that, but as of now, my consciousness tells me that life is all I have.  It is all you have, and you only have one.

 My friend’s hobby is to look around, searching for a boat.  After talking about it with him for so long, I decided I would buy one.  I decided to try it.  Before buying it, I decided to learn how a boat is made, what types of boats there were.  So I travelled through the American east coast with my girlfriend.  We visited all the boat makers to see how a sailboat is made.  And from there, I learned that there are many types of sailboats.  I learned that a sailboat is … that there are no perfect sailboats.   A boat means compromises.  A very solid boat, a sailor boat, will be slower.  A lighter, les solid boat, is going to go much faster.  The first time that I was the one responsible on board, that I was the one controlling the boat – with the wind, of course -  the first time that I shut down the engine, it took like fifteen minutes and then I felt like I was reaching every coast of the planet.  That was my feeling.  It was only a matter of time, finally.  Someday, I plan on going around the world in a sailboat.  There is all the apprenticeship aspect that comes with it that interests me.  There are a lot of small details that you absolutely have to know, because if you do not do this or that at a precise moment, it could be catastrophic.  The is the apprenticeship of the mechanics, the electricity, the navigation and the meteorology.  Some aspects never seem to finish.  I mean, learning about navigation can take a whole life.  Then there is also the discovery, the journey.  It means accumulating stories to tell while you’re alive.  To be transmitted or …  I’ll see.  I would like to … I have always been interested in documentaries.  So there will be a computer and a camera on board for sure.  Travelling is also related to my curiosity.  This is the liveliest way to travel that I have experienced up to now.   Because of that conversation with the planet, the wind, the water.  I lived moments of grace.  It is the only way I can express it.  On a sailboat, you are not the only one who decides.  The wind decides too, and you have to listen, because it could make you progress, or it could kill you if you’re not listening, if you did not learn properly.  And to learn well means to listen well, without skipping stages.  Acting is also a bit like this.  It is to listen.  We call moments of grace in acting “being in the moment”.  It becomes as real as life. Maybe even more so sometimes. 

References:

Molière in Wikipedia
The Imaginary Invalid - full text
Michelle Labonté graduated from NTS in 1987
Michelle Labonté at IMDb
In a Lifetime by Roland Lepage
Murielle Dutil at IMDb
Michelle Rossignol at IMDb

Photos from Childhood

On the Boat













Compare Roy's house

The Night Sweeper (YouTube)
The scene from the film that inspired Roy's presentation idea.

"And I remembered almost all of Le balayeur de nuit <<The Night Sweeper>> by heart, which is a Commedia dell’Arte sketch played by Molière in the movie, and I played it right in his face.  He was like <<makes a gaping face>> … I had my mom’s hat, moccasins, I went to get a broom, a paper mask, because he had one.  And I did it and he was astonish-ed.  We then played it in class.  The teacher was a Frenchman, and he was also astonished; the whole class was."