New Vaudevillians, New Mimes

Abstract

This anecdote, told in Linda Kelly’s The Young Romantics (1976, p. 86) demonstrates clearly the difference between the nineteenth-century white-faced pantomime artist’s aesthetic and that of the late-twentieth-century new vaudevillian and new mime. Deburau could only unmask, speak and deal with the important issues of the day in private performance, playing a practical joke for his friends. For that one hour in the second half of the nineteenth century, he adumbrated what would happen in the second half of the twentieth.

The famous pierrot Deburau … had also been invited [to a party given by George Sand and Musset]. He arrived disguised as a visiting British politician, wearing a stiff collar and a long black coat, unrecognisable without his pierrot’s costume and his chalk-white make-up. Throughout the dinner he maintained a truly English stiffness. … Finally the phrase ‘European equilibrium’ was mentioned. The laconic Englishman showed a sudden interest. ‘Do you wish to know how I view the European equilibrium in the present grave political situation between the continent and England?’ he asked. ‘If so, I will try to make myself clear.’ And, picking up his plate, he spun it up into the air, catching it neatly on the tip of his knife where it continued to rotate at top speed. ‘Such’, he continued, ‘is the present state of the European equilibrium. There can be no salvation without it.’ The astonished guests burst out laughing, the deception was revealed. …