With their unique pen and their own sensitivity, artists present their vision of the world to us. This week, we give carte blanche to Jean-Philippe Baril Guérard.
When is the right time to leave?
I’ve been thinking about this question a lot since Denis Coderre started his media tour a few weeks ago. While he seems convinced that he is offering us a tantalizing spectacle of stripping, in which he believes he is revealing information piecemeal, like the clickbaits of the best era of BuzzFeed, everyone has seen very clearly from the start that the emperor is naked, that he has always been naked, and that this nudity reveals only one thing: an immense need for attention.
(I know that the Liberal Party of Quebec is supposed to have a role to play in this story, but the political formation is incidental here, I think: Denis Coderre made almost as much noise for much less, when he announced, in August 2022, that he was going to “make the news” and that a “return is [préparait] », before revealing that he was starting… a mandate as a columnist on a sports show.)
It’s almost exactly the same story, in my eyes, as that of the protagonist of the film Birdman : Riggan Thomson, an actor lacking relevance after starring in superhero films in the 1990s, attempts to return to the spotlight with an adaptation of a Raymond Carver novel. His daughter sums up the story in the cruelest way possible: “You’re doing all this because you’re scared to death of not caring about anyone anymore. But you know what? You are right to be afraid. None of that matters. You’re not important. Get used to the idea. »
I think about all this a lot, not because of Coderre’s competence, or what constitutes the best political strategy for the PLQ. In politics, anyway, my favorite posture is that of making myself a popcorn before sitting comfortably to watch the slow-motion tank accidents, of which this sphere is full.
No, I think about it because this struggle that Coderre leads to exist in my gaze and in yours, it threatens many of us, particularly those whose career (and sometimes, by association, existence) depends on the gaze others. The need for attention is a hunger that only grows when it is satisfied.
Véronique Cloutier created a blood-curdling documentary series on the subject, Shadow and light, in which she interviews artists who have disappeared from public space. Almost all the ex who are interviewed there – we see, among others, Alain Dumas, Michel Goyette, Manuel Hurtubise – seem to live with a sort of thirst, a stamping, which evokes the reconfigured brain of a person struggling with an addiction, and who, even sober , must deal with a need that she cannot completely satisfy. Almost all, therefore, except Michèle-Barbara Pelletier, who herself chose to leave her career as an actress, and who, coincidentally, exudes remarkable peace and well-being.
It obsesses me because, to paraphrase La Poune, I’m not much without my audience. There is an element of vanity in this observation, yes, but also a flatly practical part: all the jobs that I practice require, in one way or another, that I speak to the world.
If the world doesn’t want me anymore, I don’t have a job anymore. I become invisible when no one looks at me. This fear of disappearing could be enough to lead me to frog in all directions to try to continue to exist, like the former mayor Coderre.
The cruelest thing is that there is no absolute expiration date: it is not a question of age, as Janette Bertrand clearly shows us, but of being of one’s time.
Would I be aware of being the turkey of the joke if I persisted even if I no longer brought grist to the mill? Would I be conscious of chasing light for light’s sake, and not the light that allows me to speak to the world? Would it be in their interest to tell me, or would they watch me struggle publicly, because the spectacle of a has been who begs for crumbs of attention, it’s all in all quite entertaining, particularly for the media?
Over time, we construct such a narrow idea of what we should be that moving away from it just a little becomes unbearable, but there is beauty in rebirth. We just have to accept the little deaths that precede them. Kate Bush, on this side, is exemplary: in a rare interview granted to the BBC, after the return to the Billboard charts, in 2022, of her 1985 song Running Up That Hillrepopularized by Stranger Things, journalist Emma Barnett asks him if this resurgence makes him want to return to the stage. “Gardening’s my thing, now”, she replies, at the age of 63. I’m into gardening now.
I feel like giving up everything to devote myself to a vocation of ski bum in the Alps sometimes, like Kate Bush with her gardening, but I know I would last two weeks, after which I would probably come back begging for attention. I know I don’t know when the right time to leave is. We have that in common, Denis Coderre and I.
Who is Jean-Philippe Baril Guérard?
- Jean-Philippe Baril Guérard is a novelist, playwright, actor and director.
- He notably published the novels Royal, Wildlife Handbook And High demolition. He has also written numerous plays, including Warwick, The singularity is near And You are animal.
- His novels Wildlife Handbook And High demolition were adapted for television.
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