‘OK, talk, but don’t make any sound!’: Philippe Gaulier’s illustrious students on his clowning glory

Comedians, theatre-makers and actors including Rachel Weisz, Sally Phillips and Simon Munnery recall the late teacher’s alarming lessons

‘He gave me permission to be an idiot’

Louise Brealey

Philippe taught me to laugh at myself. He had an understanding of people’s darkness, fears and flaws – and their shiny bits as well. He described me as “a Protestant church-mouse, sex-mad Brownie”. I felt seen! His theory was everyone has a clown. For example, David Mitchell, who I worked with on Back, has an angry clown. When David is cross and he rants, it’s hilarious. Without Philippe, I don’t think I could have done Cass in Back, Deb in Such Brave Girls or Muriel in Woman in Mind, because he gave me permission to be an idiot. I can take the piss out of myself and it doesn’t hurt.

The only moment I ever saw Philippe break into a smile at anything I did was when I was dressed top to toe in leather, hitting everyone with a stick and doing Lady Macbeth in a German accent. I don’t know what that says about my clown: she’s a very confused dominatrix. I think my clown is probably an idiot.

‘You had to keep him entertained’

Rachel Weisz

Most memorable to me were Philippe’s bouffon workshops. We played a game where he was the “king” and you were the clowns or court jesters – think naughty minions – who had to entertain him. You had to be mischievous, unruly and test the boundaries of foolery. But mostly you had to keep him entertained and interested, otherwise you were expelled from this imaginary court. You didn’t want to bore the king or be banished for going too far. He was one of the great teachers and it was one of the greatest lessons. I think of this and him often and I feel very lucky to have been taught by him.

‘I failed and failed and failed’

Damien Warren-Smith (AKA Garry Starr)

I’d moved to the UK from Australia and I found myself in ensembles doing classical plays where I was the butt of the joke for being uncultured. People were constantly referring to me as a convict. When I discovered clown, I realised not only does it not matter if people don’t take me seriously, it is an incredible feeling to embrace it and say, “Whatever you find ridiculous about me, I give you permission to laugh at that.”

Going to École Philippe Gaulier was tough. I failed and failed and failed. I can still remember the first time I really made him laugh. Two clowns were doing a scene that was going really badly and I stepped on as Monsieur Loyal, the boss clown, and started clapping and saying, “I told you they were great, didn’t I?” Philippe chuckled and pointed at me: “He’s such a bastard!”

You will be your funniest, you will come alive, you will be your most beautiful in your moment of failure. It is not the doing that makes you funny, it is seeing how you feel about the shit thing you have just done.

Garry Starr is a high-status character and an idiot. The reason people are so willing to get up in my shows is that I’m the butt of the joke. I fail, but I’m so happy to fail. People who say they would never get up on stage are all of a sudden volunteering to do horrific things.

‘Philippe said: You! Kick him up the arse!’

Simon Munnery

In the workshops, everyone seemed to have a moment when they were hilarious. We were coming towards the end and he asked who hadn’t had a moment. It was me and a Swiss juggler.

He was a big, tall, muscular bloke and not in any way funny. He started talking and Philippe pointed to someone and said, “You! Kick him up the arse!” It was like being tortured. He clearly didn’t enjoy it. “You! Kick him on the cheek!” He was fiddling with this bloke’s performance, in front of him, live. He tried various things until he said, “OK, speak loudly!”

The Swiss bloke started shouting and it was hilarious. All 25 of us wept with laughter. It was genuine: he was so angry at the position he’d been put in. Later, I told him it was funny and it wasn’t what he wanted to know. He wanted to be in control.

Then Philippe got me to talk and he tried the same things. Nothing was working. Then he said, “OK, talk, but don’t make any sound.” And I had a moment. It was hilarious. I couldn’t put a foot wrong. It was like walking along a thick tightrope. I sat down and I could see then why the Swiss bloke was so upset. It was the pain of people laughing at you.

‘The ghost of the game was there’

Sally Phillips

You could apply his method to anything. I did Shakespeare, Chekhov and Greek tragedy with him. He got Romeo and Juliet kissing each other on the nose after every line, then he took the kiss out. It was so nice because there was an echo of the nose kiss, the ghost of the game was there.

In Smack the Pony, I’d had this idea about a woman who stacks the entire supermarket with Toilet Duck and then the boss comes in and says, “Why’ve you done that?” I was thinking the gag would be that every time the camera changed angle, you’d see another aisle of Toilet Duck. Then I remembered Gaulier and thought: Ah! The funniest thing would be not knowing. It’s about how your humanity is visible when you don’t know what you’re doing. And it’s completely gripping watching that. It was a girl who’d stopped concentrating and she didn’t have a good answer. It was much better than having a reason.

His teaching has fed into my experience of parenting my son with Down’s syndrome. Olly never has a fail, he is always 100% alive and he is not boring. You’re anti-productivity, anti all these masks, the world isn’t about A-levels and you’re being in the moment. I’ve found a language to speak with Olly because this kind of play has been a foundation of my professional career.

‘I had never seen somebody speak in such a polarising, hilarious way’

Zach Zucker (AKA Jack Tucker)

I was a very unfunny 19-year-old student, working at the UCB theater in Los Angeles. My manager used to work for Sacha Baron Cohen’s company and told me there was an intern spot there and, by the way, Sacha’s clown teacher is coming to LA. I went to this workshop and I had never seen somebody speak to people in such a polarising, hilarious way. I got the job with Sacha and, six months in, I told him I wanted to go to Gaulier. Sacha said, “Go!”

I was only supposed to go for six months but, three weeks in, I saw my second-year counterparts do a vaudeville scene that blew my mind. I signed up for the whole two years that night. My company, Stamptown, is named after Étampes, where the clown school is based, and our logo is the castle from the town.

People’s stories tend to be, “Philippe told me I was terrible and it was very embarrassing.” But first and foremost, the guy was a clown. He loved to laugh more than anything.

‘You didn’t hold back’

Emily Woof

I loved some of the other things he taught, especially melodrama and bouffon. Doing melodrama, we used to do this exercise where you would sit at a table, drinking a glass of wine in a stew of melancholy. There would be music playing. Then you’d suddenly slam the table, look up to the gods and go, “Not that music!”

In melodrama, he wanted you to play to the gods, to the poor people who couldn’t afford the other seats in the theatre. It was about unleashing a generosity of spirit, you didn’t hold back. You had a lift in the head and in the voice. His way of playing it was generous and embodied. It was a real discipline. If you didn’t hit it, you couldn’t get away with it because it’s too crazy, too big. You had to be absolutely true.

Bouffon is almost the opposite of clown: you’re an outsider who comes in to mock the bourgeoisie. You’re the one that’s got the upper hand. You come on stage with an edge and I took that edge into my own work. In clown you love the audience, but bouffon is a much more twisted form.

‘Slowly, you realised how to engage with the audience’

Hamish McColl

The word everyone dreaded was “suivant” (next) which really meant “get off”. You would go up and open your mouth and get “suivant”. You would come away mystified. “What did I do? I just opened my mouth!” Slowly, you realised what it was, which was how to engage with the audience in that moment.

As a director, you’re constantly looking for the work to be present, true, alive and dynamic. His short threshold for things not working – and he was tyrannical – stayed with me. “Pour faire rire le public,” he would say. “It’s to make the audience laugh.” Are they engaged? Are they with you? If they’re not, “suivant!”

‘It’s about what’s happening in that moment’

Cal McCrystal

He told you not to bring ideas in with you because it was like filling your arms with suitcases. When you come in, you see this wonderful suitcase on the floor but you can’t pick it up because your arms are full. The performance has got to be about what’s happening in that moment.

My whole career leads back to Philippe. Even when I’m working at English National Opera, I say, “This feeling of pleasure, mischief and connection with the audience is not a layer that you put on top of the show: it is the show.”

Philippe once said you should come in with the pleasure of your four-year-old son who thinks it’s a good idea to come down stairs naked when you’ve got guests. The child who doesn’t know why it’s wrong but really wants to do it: that is mischief.