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Jean-Marie Bigard, the "clown" who wanted to become president

2020-06-14T21:40:55.936Z


At 66, comedian Jean-Marie Bigard, as popular as controversial, casts doubt on a desire to run for president


In one of his most famous sketches, Jean-Marie Bigard says he is afraid of rabid bats even though there is only one in ten million chance of being bitten. A "premonitory" gag, he would have recently been blown on the phone by Professor Didier Raoult, at the time of questions about the origin of the coronavirus. "It is a sketch that shows that what cannot happen can happen anyway", even the most improbable, philosopher the humorist. Like a Bigard presidential candidacy, for example?

After having been in turn bartender, handball player, gym teacher, manager of night club, most popular comic in France (in 2004) and, for a few years, subscribed to reports sent to the Superior Audiovisual Council (CSA) , the 66-year-old Trojan says he is “interested” in the Elysée race, as he had the opportunity to announce on BFMTV on May 27. No more laughing.

"If it was a joke, it would be laughing at the mouth of the people," he said learnedly, welcoming Le Parisien in his vast parquet-moldings-fireplace apartment in the very chic 6th arrondissement of Paris. It is here, a thousand leagues from the roundabouts of the Yellow Vests where he so much likes "having a drink", that the artist with more than a million subscribers on Facebook takes a selfie to push his rants multi-daily.

In 2004, Jean-Marie Bigard filled the Stade de France./DR  

That day, it is the racism trial that is made to the police after the death of George Floyd in the United States that makes him angry. "The American phenomenon is coming and we swallow it all believed!" He belched. His sentences end in a howl, punctuated by punches on the table. Tears run from time to time on the weathered face. A raw, uncontrolled, almost primitive anger. Like that of the "people" which he erected as a megaphone.

After all, isn't he the only comic to have filled a stadium in France? It was in 2004. Since then, he has left the glossy pages of the celebrity pages to make the front page of the very right- wing Valeurs Actuelles , under the heading “we can't say anything anymore”.

Let the pressure cooker heat over low heat

He does not deprive himself, however. Like this March 26 when he asked Emmanuel Macron for masks, tests and gowns. The video is viewed millions of times and earns him a presidential call. A phone call that this devout Catholic interprets as a sign of fate. It comes back to his mind the posters brandished by certain spectators in his rooms: "Bigard president" and the wind of free-spiritedness in Italy and in Ukraine which brought clowns to play the leading roles on the political scene. "I let the pressure cooker heat over low heat", he delights.

For the time being, his program comes down to the message of his t-shirt: "go all get fucked ...". "It's my flag. A promise or a threat, depending on taste… ”he smiles. Is Nicolas Sarkozy's former support from the right, from the left? "Common sense", boots on the essayist Philippe Pascot, author of "State Lies" (Ed. Max Milo). This former deputy mayor of Evry with Manuel Valls, now a yellow cardigan, advises the humorist in his first steps, not in politics, but in "public health", he nuances. Next June 16, he said, Jean-Marie Bigard will be on the street alongside the nursing staff.

"I'm going to get sprayed"

Four days later, in a show broadcast live and streaming at the Apollo theater (10 euros per seat), he will say, without filter and without CSA, what he thinks of the management of the coronavirus by the government. A mixture of valves and anti-elite diatribes which he prepares with his friend-author Fabien Delettres. "He's going to let go," promises his producer, David Hardit.

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And sketch a semblance of a program. For example a “pilot basket of the housewife with three meats and 15 fruits and vegetables” whose low prices would be guaranteed by eliminating the intermediaries between producer and consumer. "The Yellow Vest, what will he think of my idea, you think?" He pretends to wonder. "If we stop licking your ass to the powers of money, you can live again," he blushes, grabbing a bottle of Pinot Noir branded "Bigard" and decorated with an evocative kangaroo brief.

In 2007, the humorist (here with Pierre Palmade) supports the candidacy of Nicolas Sarkozy./JOKER / BESTIMAGE  

“In the political arena, I'm going to get sprayed. I don't know how to play that, I don't know how to dribble ”, however, he seems to hesitate. In 2015, he swore he regretted having taken sides with Nicolas Sarkozy eight years before. "It's poop, politics, don't touch it!" He assured then. The king of scat humor now has his eyes on the polls.

That of Ifop indicates that 13% of French people would be ready to vote for him, including 3% "certainly". The rate rises to 21% among voters of Marine Le Pen, 14% among those of Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “Macron has liquidated the center. Me, I have in hand to reduce the two extremes ”, jubilant the one who had not yet been reluctant to play Fréjus last year… at the invitation of the mayor RN of the city while his summer tour had been canceled after yet another scandal.

Waiting for yellow vests

Can Bigard dry up the RN vote? The idea makes Marine Le Pen laugh. "Fortunately for him since he is a humorist! She puts it back in her place, assuring that "the French are waiting for a serious, constructed project". Pollster Jérôme Fourquet, author of the opinion poll, also tempers the enthusiasm of the anti-system troublemaker. “In the survey, Bigard is not tested in competition with the rest of the political offer. Its base is closer to 2 or 3%. "At Coluche, social and political criticism surfaced in the sketches. This was also the case with Beppe Grillo [the founder of the Italian 5-star movement]. At Bigard, the political analysis grid is nothingness. "

This does not prevent the French who feel yellow vests from joining the project at 32%, still according to Ifop. "I think he is sincere. But now he has to assume. People will trust actions, not words, "warns Jérémy Clément, one of the" leaders "of the fluorescent chasuble movement, who nevertheless notes:" People talk about it, his message is received. positively. The popular support, in his videos and on roundabouts, he won in theaters, big and small, which he tirelessly walks like a marathon runner.

His show of Bercy in 2001 is broadcast live in 300 village halls, live streaming before the hour in front of 70,000 people. In some villages, where we have taken out the giant screen and the plastic chairs, the meeting has the air of a World Cup final. An appetizer before the consecration of the Stade de France and its 52,000 spectators, three years later.

"He's a bit of a comedian Johnny"

"Bigard in all, it's 4 million spectators and 8 million DVDs sold," insists his producer as the artist prepares to leave, in September, for a tour of a hundred dates. "Whatever he does, the public responds," remarks his friend Antoinette Colin, director of the legendary Point-Virgule performance hall. Beyond the artistic, people also come to look for the human aspect, they know its generosity, its wholeness, and it touches them. He's a bit of a comedian Johnny. "

A legendary generosity, a "big heart that stains", as he says, which he exhibits like a hunting picture. One day it is the nephew of his caretaker, in terminal cancer, to whom he pays a miracle treatment. Another, a maternity hospital in Burkina Faso, which he finances, or that of Guingamp, threatened with closure, for which he is mobilizing in 2018. And is already earning him a first telephone exchange with Brigitte Macron.

"At home, it's almost a drug to be of service," says his older brother Jean-Pierre, director of the Palais des Glaces who has worked with him for a long time. When I kept the accounts, we often yelled at about it, he wanted to give to all those who needed it! "

"I've been laughing since I got out of my mother's tuft"

If the one who is also the sponsor of the humanitarian association Bouchons d'amour is so sensitive to social injustice, it is because he has not been spared by life either. His working mother dies of cancer when he is only 23 years old; his father, a pork butcher, was murdered with a knife a year later.

“He is the last of our siblings of four children. He has always had this fear of not being wanted, this need, stronger than among others, to be loved, ”recalls his eight-year-old elder. The youngest readily admits it himself. "I've been laughing since I got out of my mother's tuft," he says in his big voice. I arrived in a tuxedo and I shouted: Keep me, don't throw me, look, I'm funny! "

An inexhaustible thirst for recognition - in addition to a wine, it also has a scent to its name - which has been undermined over the years. After September 11, his conspiratorial remarks, to which he will return lip-service, crumple. "He sent me conspiracy videos. It scared the hell out of me and I set foot with him at the time, ”said one of his former friends. In 2019, a joke on the set of Cyril Hanouna, recounting the rape of a doctor on a patient - "I have been doing it for thirty years", he sighs - earned him a referral to the CSA and a canceled tour.

"Bitch, this is the most beautiful compliment"

Why this rudeness, taken to the extreme? "At the beginning, I seized this niche because nobody wanted to take it, I had fun, assures this father of three children, in a relationship with the actress of Plus belle la vie , Lola Marois. But the vulgar words, they are brilliant, colorful! These are magic words! "

Since his beginnings in 1987 in "the Class" on FR3, he has made his business in this style "cock, hair, balls", as he calls it himself. "Bitch, in my mouth, it is the most beautiful compliment that one can make to a woman," he provokes. She sleeps with whomever she wants, she represents the free woman. "

In 2006, he performed at the Théâtre de Paris in "le Bourgeois gentilhomme". / AFP / Bertrand Guay  

"I like it, but it has twisted for a long time," breathes a very prominent comic. Misogynist, cheesy, vulgar, megalomaniac ... Many people make a pout at the mere mention of his name. In the middle, however, whoever says he admires the writing of a Gaspard Proust or a Blanche Gardin holds others in respect. For his work force, in particular. “Jean-Marie is a real mechanic, observes psychoanalyst and editorial writer Gérard Miller, who co-wrote his show 100% brand new . When, in writing a sketch, he is sure that laughter is possible at such and such a time, to the nearest second, he will find it the next day on stage. "

"Rather to be buried than to improve"

"It's a monster," says producer Kader Aoun, former director of Jamel Debbouze. He climbed higher than anyone. He has a crazy comic power and is an unrivaled storyteller, who has no limits. At the time of #MeToo, it does not always pass. "

What create resentment and a thirst for revenge in him. “I love this man, whatever he does, defends the director Claude Lelouch who made him turn in Each life . I never found it vulgar but political. And he is right to speak of ass, it is the main concern of humanity. Those who act by listening to the beating of their heart and not just the beating of their gray matter, we can forgive them all. "Blame him for a skit, he will make it a standard. Ask him to calm down, he will get more excited. Bigard prefers to get locked up than to improve, ”analyzes Gérard Miller.

The comedian appeared on the lists of Marcel Campion during the municipal 2020 in Paris./Thomas Padilla / MAXPPP  

A headlong rush which today makes him carry the qualifier of "beauf" as standard. "Beauf is the one who is in love with the people, who does not hesitate to rub against the people", he proudly proclaims. From there to really rub at the polls? "I want to see how far he can go," answers Claude Lelouch. If Trump is president, Bigard can be. Maybe we need to laugh more. "I am very well known ... Why don't I scare them a little at all these enc ...?" "Concludes the interested party. With the false air of a rabid bat.

Bio Express

1954. Birth in Fontaine-Luyères, in the Aube.

1987. It is revealed to the general public in the entertainment program "la Classe" on FR3.

1988. First single-in-scene “Did you say Bigard? At Point-Virgule.

2004. He plays the last performance of his show "Animals and Men" at the Stade de France in front of 52,000 spectators.

2007. A devout Catholic, he accompanied Nicolas Sarkozy to the Vatican and was received by Pope Benedict XVI.

2020. On May 27, in an interview with BFMTV, he announced that he was “interested” in a candidacy for the 2022 presidential election.

Source: leparis

All news articles on 2020-06-14

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