Friday, March 7, 2014

James Thiérrée: On the Difficulty of Sitting Down

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After my post on eccentric dancer George Campo's incredible chair routine, which came by way of Betsy Baytos, I got a link by way of Ted Shapiro to a chair piece performed by James Thiérrée. Well, sort of a chair piece, because it's about his near-futile efforts to get his rag-doll body to somehow ooze into a proper seated position on a chair. Turns out all he really needed was for a strong woman to administer a swift kick to the seat of his pants.

For those of you unfamiliar with Thiérrée, he is a grandson of Charlie Chaplin and sister of Aurélia Thiérrée, and both of them have (separately) created and starred in numerous full-length pieces of visual theatre that are all rich in original physical comedy. See links below....



Links:
• Articles about Thiérrée reproduced on Pat Cashin's clownalley.net blog.
• My blog post: James Thiérrée in Raoul
• My blog post:  Aurélia's Oratorio at the Berkeley Rep