with “Le Grand Cirque”, Booder brings a smile back to sick children

It was at the Robert-Debré hospital in Paris that Booder gave us an appointment to talk about his film The Great Circus. The story of Momo, a clown who brings joy to seriously ill children. A film inspired by his own life. “You have a survivor in front of you, I am living my second life. I was born with severe asthma, with bronchiolitis and respiratory arrest“, explains the 44-year-old actor born in Morocco. Arrived in France to be treated, he will spend seven years of his life at the Necker hospital in Paris. It is there that he will meet the famous clowns.

“They want us to look at them as children”

“I dreamed of being visited from time to time on my hospital bed. That people I saw on TV could come into my room and say just a few words to me”, continues Booder. Today, he is the one who goes to the bedside of sick children, just to share a few jokes and give them a smile. ” When I go to see children in hospitals, the first thing we learn is not to talk about the disease. They want to be looked at as children, not as sick children”he says.