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Quotes

"You see a bad mime and a rhinoceros, you prefer the rhinoceros of  course."
"There is nothing better than a human face...there you have theatre.  You mustn't wear the theatre on your head like a big hat.  The theatre is you.  It doesn't exist without your simplicity."
There are actors who play as if waiting for some tyrannical priest to order them to leave the bright lights of the stage and to seek refuge in the shadows of a cave - a cave of repentance and remorse.  These are the bad actors.  Inherent in theatre is the physical sensation of light.  The play of the actor takes root in light and it is in light that he is exposed.  My teachings are based on the pleasure of play, on the challenge of being exposed in light; the pleasure of crying, "Yoo-hoo! It's me!" as if you were the great surprise everybody had been waiting for.  It is based on the joy of losing oneself in the light for a few moments so as to awaken something in your audience. 
Perhaps regret.


With my friends, we play games to scare ourselves. It's a laugh. My teaching is based on the pleasure of play and, running through everything, that marvellous fear which each one of us carries in our hearts and that sharpens our sensitivity.
It's not fear that petrifies us but shame.
We don't play to make ourselves ashamed.
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"The role of the theatre teacher is not to teach someone to be good, but to have fun being good."

My school is not a normal school because you learn there what you never learn in other schools: the pleasure of acting, the fixed point, fantasy.  You learn that an actor is good when his desire to act is stronger than his task of interpreting a character.  An actor is good when he sows in our imagination the little touches that make the character seem at times true-to-life, at times a little fuzzy, at times out-of-reach.  An actor is good when he fleshes out the ghost of a character in our imagination -- he is bad when he wants really to be the character. An actor is good when he paints in just enough detail to create the shadowy outline of the character in our imagination.



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Student Comments and Letters
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Dear Philippe- Your school was one of the greatest creative experiences of my life!   Thank you.
Emma Thompson
"He is a provocateur devastatingly honest and uncompromising...He has the outstanding skill of being able to fit the appropriate exercise to the particular actor...His incisive coments are like subjecting yourself to openheart surgery whithout anesthetic, and the only thing that makes it bearable is Gaulier's wicked sense of humour."
John Wright, Total Theatre
"For Gaulier theatre is not about discovering the truth, but about uncovering the joy of make believe."
Jill Lawless, Now

"The games develop a lightness and deftness of response.  The act of sharing in a game is encapsulated in Gaulier's criterion for the actor-complicite."
Naseem Khan, Times

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back to splash Dear Philippe,
Congratulations on the anniversary of your school.

The word genius is too readily used, but with you it is appropriate.  You have x-ray vision, an ability to see through someone's pretentions and learned behavior into someone's true spirit, the moment they walk on stage.  What makes you truly great is that you then know how to make them reveal it.  I remember during a clown course, when you told a German girl dressed as a caveman(who was convinced that she was the sweetest girl in Munich) to hit her partner in the head with the large club she was holding.  After a big argument, she eventually relented, the moment the club made contact the class burst into hysterics.  And the harder she hit, the harder we all laughed.  You knew the moment you saw her that deep down she was a bitch, and the moment she revealed it to the class, the result was comedy.

The months I studied with you were among the most inspiring of my life.  You are the only teacher I have ever met, who can actually teach students how to be funny.  The purity of the comedy and theatre that I learnt at your school, is something that I try to emulate every time I perform.  All the characters that I play, Ali G or any of the others are all deeply rooted in the 'clown' and 'bouffon' courses.

Your anarchic sensibility forces the students to create something that is truly original, not confined by the conservative sensibilities of other acting schools.  You are somehow able to get students to find the one thing that it is that makes them enjoyable to watch on stage.  The Wonderful and unique thing about your school is that it's amazing fun, there's none of the tedious soul-searching of other drama schools, you simply teach the pure pleasure of being on stage.  I have never laughed as hard as I did those few months, and never been as happy as when you turned to the class and admitted 'Sacha was okay today, non?'.  The relief at not being called 'a bit shit' was enormous.  Your total honesty forced me to really experiment and your guidance helped me discover how to love being on stage.  Philippe, studying with you gave me the confidence to pursue a career in acting, and it gave me the skills to do so successfully.  Thank you professeur, it was a privilege studying with you.  SachaXX
Sacha Baron Cohen, October 2, 2005
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