Famed French mime Marcel Marceau dies at 84

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Marcel Marceau, who revived the art of mime and brought poetry to silence, has died, his former assistant said today. He was 84.

Marceau died Saturday in Paris, French media reported. Former assistant Emmanuel Vacca announced the death on France-Info radio, but gave no details about the cause.

Wearing white face paint, soft shoes and a battered hat topped with a red flower, Marceau, notably through his famed personnage Bip, played the entire range of human emotions onstage for more than 50 years, never uttering a word. Offstage, however, he was famously chatty. "Never get a mime talking. He won't stop," he once said.

A French Jew, Marceau survived the Holocaust — and also worked with the French Resistance to protect Jewish children.

His biggest inspiration was Charlie Chaplin. Marceau, in turn, inspired countless young performers — Michael Jackson borrowed his famous "moonwalk" from a Marceau sketch, Walking Against the Wind.

Marceau performed tirelessly around the world until late in life, never losing his agility, never going out of style. In one of his most poignant and philosophical acts, Youth, Maturity, Old Age, Death, he wordlessly showed the passing of an entire life in just minutes.

"Do not the most moving moments of our lives find us without words?" he once said.

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I have to admit I've never really liked mime. I've always thought it was a bit silly, and never understood the point. You know, I liked the mime/waiters in Spinal Tap, but that was only because it was making fun of them.

But I also have to admit that Marceau's work has ended up heavily influencing me over the years, albeit indirectly. The whole concept of distilling the essence of humanity into clear and concise movement has been something of a mainstay in the actor training I've received, at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. I mean, I'm no mime, but the ability to think like one, to be able to find distinct emotional meaning in gesture or posture or even walking across the room, is invaluable to the actor. And it's not just about abstract emotions, either. When done correctly, this kind of work can make an audience weep as well as laugh.

Actually, some of my teachers over the years have studied directly under people who were taught by Marceau. Ultimately, I really owe him a lot. He's the guy who started this whole line of thinking. And in the end, it's transformed my entire understanding of acting. Because, when you get right down to it, acting isn't about how you say the words, it's about how you live the role and the movement work derived from Marceau's mime work is a major gateway into that.

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