QA few days after his death at the age of 96, Michel Bouquet, monument of French theater, received Wednesday April 27 a national tribute chaired by Emmanuel Macron. The President of the Republic spoke during the traditional eulogy at the Hôtel National des Invalides, just after the speeches of Fabrice Luchini, Pierre Arditi and Muriel Robin, who was a pupil of Michel Bouquet at the Conservatoire. The Head of State hailed a man who “reigned the theater as a sacred monster”. “He enlightened our minds, burned the boards and punctured the screen. Michel Bouquet believed in his characters as one believes in divinities,” he added.
Shortly before, Muriel Robin had paid tribute to a “giant” of French comedy: “Sir, you opened the doors to me of such a vast world: the theater. Thanks to you, I discovered the words, their weight, their delicacy”, she declared in this text written in the form of a letter addressed to her master, whom she considers to be her “father of the theater “. For his part, Fabrice Luchini regretted a “genius”: “You were the essence and the unique”, he declared in a vibrant voice. “My dear Michel, your disappearance will leave a huge void in this family of actors of which you were the most singular, the most astonishing representative”, he added. “Your voice is eternal. »
The ceremony, which began at 4 p.m., was open to the public, in the presence of the actor’s family and friends. At the end of his speech, Emmanuel Macron placed a white rose at the foot of the portrait of Michel Bouquet and the students of the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art followed him, while “Soave sia il vento” by So Fan All of Mozart was played. A minute of silence was finally respected.
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Unforgettable in The king is dying by Ionesco, which he has played no less than 800 times, and in The Miser of Molière, Michel Bouquet died on April 13 after more than seventy-five years of career. Born November 6, 1925 in Paris, the son of an officer who had become a prisoner of war, Michel Bouquet owed his taste for the spectacle to his mother, who regularly took him to the Opéra-Comique.
“Each time the curtain rose, there was no longer the horror of the war, there were no longer Germans around (…), the unreal world far exceeded the real world. It was the best lesson of my life,” he told Agence France-Presse in 2019.