Orinally posted on Friday, January 15, 2010
One of my guilty pleasures is Project Runway. I just love Timothy Gunn swanning about his NY Fashion Ave workroom pouting “Designers... how are you doing? Work with me. “ .... His unctuous voice dripping concern.... And then what’s her name, Heidi Nazi Klum, with her litte ego- cutting code line "You’re out, Auf Weindersehen”. My first week at Philippe Gaulier has been the Parisian version ( only much much nastier) of Project Runway. Imagine the Line-up of Shame at the end of PR when the losers face their worst nightmares: public humiliation, excoriation, evisceration.... told that their work is SHIT, and then..... YOU”RE OUT!!! This is the psychic equivalent of the Romans feeding the Christians to the lions. The taste of blood in some mouths is sweet. Simon Callow is another one.... TV audiences can’t wait to hear what horrifyingly nasty verbal vituperation he has saved up for his next Idol vicitim. And he relishes the cutting.
None of them hold a candle to Monsieur Philippe Gaulier. At the end of each exercise, the participating actors ( usually 8-12 of us) are lined up in front of the rest of the class and he asks “Who was the most boring? Who made you so happy when they left the stage? Who would you like to kill?” One young woman from Romania was told that Ceaucescu should have shot her. I was told I should be killed in Pakistan. A Japanese woman was told that MacArthur didn’t finish his job since she was still alive. It’s truly ludicrous. And while you’re working he screams “ You are so f***king boring, leave the stage immediately!!!” I’ve learned that this invective is actually a challenge to do better, but instead it stuns me into silence and provokes a desire for the earth to open up and swallow me.
He also enjoys physical abuse --- we “play” a game at the beginning of class-- a sort of “Simon says” and classmates turn on each other saying “I denounce Thelma” ... Thelma must either then ‘buy’ kisses from someone or Philippe flips Thelma over by twisting her arm behind her back and then hits her and bends her thumb as if to break it.. I’m really not making this up.
So this week has been challenging, to say the very least. It has not been fantastic. Coupled with the slightly disfiguring black eye, I don’t quite know who I am. I am knocked off my pins. I have met some lovely people, but I now know the rules of the game..... No matter what you do, you are subject to abuse and derision. The only way to look at it is as a game. If you are afraid, you’re dead. Sharks smell fear in the water.
Attention! Big Boobs are no longer funny!
Originally posted on Saturday, January 23, 2010
So,today, finally, I stopped caring. Its ‘a good thing, really, and I’ll tell you why. It’s because big boobs are no longer funny.
I’ve spent an incredibly disorienting two weeks navigating my way around the personality of this sociopath, my teacher, Philippe Gaulier. Richard also has been scrambling to keep up with my desperate phone calls, patiently and with so much love listening to my anecdotes of torture and degradation. AND! I’ve gone back to the Church! . Because, did you know, for each new church you visit you get three wishes? ( Catholic childhood mythology) Each of my wishes at each and every church is for courage.
I continue to ask myself the question: is there something I’m doing/not doing that could turn this around? What is the key, the secret, where is the magic door , or the magic words that unlock the magic door or just the magic bullet I can use to put this maniac out of my misery? I barely survive 10 seconds a try at the improvs he invents. I make an entrance, begin to speak, he beats his drum and says in a bored voice: “Horrible. Paula Plum, very nice woman, but so boring. Have a piece of cake. Adios.”
I have summoned all the survival lessons I have learned in 56 years on this planet... Recalling for instance, the light shed by Victor Frankl in Man’s Search for Meaning. Frankl’s wisdom and philosophy always serves me when times get tough. Essentially he says I have the freedom to choose an attitude toward the inevitable suffering of life. So I’m trying to choose an attitude. ( not caring) Richard suggests “ironic detachment” , treating this as a sort of -out-of -body experience, watching from a distance without emotional involvement. Unfortunately emotional detachment is not in my gene pool. I usually jump feet first into the deep end. It also does not serve when summoning the passion for the work. At night I think, “Hey , it’s really OK. It’s only three hours a day. I can handle that. “ Then in the morning it takes all my stamina and denial just to get myself to the train.
Anecdotally, doesn’t this sound fairly pathetic? Even as I write this I’m thinking, I’m a Fox Grant recipient? I’m a Distinguished Alum of Boston University? Would a Pulitzer Prize make this any less painful? How about an Oscar?
So: Why I stopped caring. Last weekend we had monsoons in Paris. Saturday, in the deluge, I hunted down costume/mask stores in the Marais district and for a mere 100 Euros assembled a mess of supplies to complete my mask-making assignment. ( Gaulier: "Make three masks. Something funny, a nose.")
I was also heartened in my soggy solitude to suddenly have a wave of inspiration for a scenario for my mask group. A silly idea, but silly is good, no? ...I was in Monoprix in the lingerie department and voila: enormous “soutiens - gorges” ( soutiens = “holding under” = brassiere in French. Amusing, non? ) Suddenly life seemed sunnier. I had masks to make and a workable funny idea for our group mask scene: two women hanging out their lingerie on a clothesline with obvious differences in their pulchritude as demonstrated by said lingerie. All right, a little déclassé, but this is CLOWN people, and low humor has always been the order of the day. I mean, it started with enormous phalluses , OK? Big boobs is not such a leap.
You know the rest of the story. Gaulier hated it, said it was “a horrible moment, boring. We were scandalized by bras in the 60’s but today it is boring.” Boring boring boring. “Boring” is his favorite word. Go ahead. Google “Gaulier boring”. I dare you. Anyway, my group of four women had followed my lead and my idea failed. There was not one laugh. Amongst ourselves, we called it “Le Flop”. He gave us a zero. This is his other favorite thing, screaming in the most exaggeratedly bad Pepe La Pue accent “ You get a zero!”
Msr. Gaulier 
The Innocent Masks
Can I just say a word about masks here? ( Remember, We’re doing this lingerie scenario in gigantic white masks) These masks are enormous and enigmatic and graceful and clumsy and astonishing. There is a childlike wonder in their expressions. The masks are innocent and each has a ‘spirit” ; one is led by the ‘spirit’ of the mask. The mask leads you, directs you. If you show your will, the mask dies. You and the audience discover the mask together.
Physically, however, all poetry and art aside, the mask sits on your head like a vice. There is a pair of -- literally-- PIN holes for eyes so you are virtually blind AND can’t breathe because the mask covers your head and there’s no ventilation. If you have the slightest inclination toward claustrophobia, masks are not your game. So while you are blind and suffocating you summon your “esprit” and go for it. The poetry, I mean. Yeah, go for the poetry, be simple, be subtle, and try not to die or have a heart attack.
So: why I stopped caring. Well, partly it was the big boob debacle. Then there was this:
I discovered I loved the mask-making project . We were to use half masks cut off just below the nose , so no suffocation. ( AHHH !!! That’s me taking a breath), and basically, the expression can be whatever evolves in your experimentation with clay, plastic and papier mache. I really got into it. At home in my little flat, I made an Alfred E. Neuman face with big ears and a goofy expression. Then, what I liked to think of as the “Mean Concierge” emerged-- a pale blue/gray hooked nose kind of witch stereotype , but with a little French Attitude. All told, I spent about 20 hours creating these two pieces and I love them. Wednesday I
gathered costumes for my two characters and flew to school thinking, “Yeah, OK. Masks.”
So , Mme Mean Concierge is offstage about to make her entrance,in my pencil skirt, black sweater, boots and turban with a terrifying bug brooch pinned into my headpiece. I have ideas for improvisation, but nothing is set, because the secret is to “deconner”-- to be willing to fool around with the audience. It’s about --as always- being in the moment . I make my entrance. I say something ---( I honestly don’t remember what) and he screams “ No! this is NOT the voice of this mask. You have to talk with a Texas accent. You are American.” I shout back, “I am not Texan, I am French Canadian!” ( I am, actually) He screams , “Start over this is horrible and you don’t want to show your elastic (the elastic that holds the mask to your head) when you exit! Idiot!”I scream back “ No, I want to show my ASS when I exit.” ( Ha, Got him...... Pause) He says, “That is a very important part of the body” I want to say, “Yeah and you can kiss mine.” As if reading my thoughts he screams “Exit quickly QUICKLY!!!.” I say “ I will exit at my own speed”, and do.
Offstage. Breathe. Reenter immediately. I begin again. “So...” Gaulier beating on drum, more screaming: “NO, Adios. Leave the stage IMMEDIATELY. Horrible. No voice..You get a ZERO. .” Twenty hours of work, 30 seconds on stage. Zero. And as I put my witch mask on the bench, and cross back to my seat, he ends with “Your mask is kind of a self-portrait, no?”
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