“Tonight, it will not be Shakespeare”, warns Christine Morency at the very beginning of Gracea first show that shows that she actually has more in common with Jean-Marc Parent than with the author of macbeth, but which above all confirms that she was born for the stage. To be or not to be a comedian? It is absurd, almost implausible, to imagine that she has long asked herself this question.
True to form, Christine Morency took to the Olympia stage to the sound of a reggaeton rhythm. But it’s not every night that the comedian is greeted with a huge ovation, as was the case on Wednesday, an even rarer testimony of enthusiasm during a media premiere.
Afflicted by laryngitis, Christine Morency almost had to postpone this premiere, which would have been perfectly understandable, but which would not have resembled this woman “made on the rough”. as she immediately describes herself. With a first issue in the form of a self-portrait of an “unrefined girl”, but whose warmth immediately arouses affection, the 36-year-old newcomer puts her cards on the table. She could not be better defined than when she compares herself to this “cousin not barred” who speaks too loudly and on whom all families can count for laughs, once the bottles are well started.
Woven with anecdotes of explosive zaniness, Grace bears the mark of the influence of two veterans of whom Christine Morency has often spoken in interviews: Lise Dion and Jean-Marc Parent. It borrows from the first not only a great sense of self-mockery, but also the same physical intensity, carried by a magnificent abandon. Each joke becomes the pretext for a grimace exacerbating the hilarity of a text that would be much less so without these pranks and other antics.
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Christine Morency, during her media premiere at the Olympia
As for the host of The JMP hour, she borrows a modus operandi consisting of using funny, but somewhat banal moments in life as a basic framework. Catastrophic visit to La Ronde, catastrophic visit to the water slides, catastrophic visit to an all-inclusive, catastrophic hair removal session: Christine Morency declines several variations of the same story, almost all having in common a body that collides with a world designed for slim people.
Without highlighting her message, the comedian thus highlights the involuntary grossophobia of the society in which we live, but above all uses her anecdotes as a springboard to laugh at herself.
Anyone else would tell these stories that they would most likely leave us frozen, but Christine Morency infuses them with an explosive energy, allowing them to transcend their more or less innocuous aspect. Her monologues almost all reach a high point during which she machine-guns her audience with gags, somewhere between the feminism of an Ali Wong and the vulgarity of the cabaret era.
And despite the obscenity of some of her numbers in which sex is discussed, Christine Morency never really shocks, probably because it is impossible to blame the not barred cousin for going just a little too much. far.
not lie
Grace therefore embodies the perfect example of a first show in which almost all the numbers hit the mark, but which nevertheless remains a little on the surface. A passage during which Christine Morency pushes the second degree to its last limit by lamenting that she has never been sexually harassed, unlike all her friends, points in the direction of greater audacity in terms of tone and form. , but contrasts too much with the rest. As proof, the comedian will feel the need to specify that this is irony, which everyone had of course already understood.
“I didn’t lie to you,” she repeats frequently, a phrase that perfectly encapsulates the reasons why her incredible stories are so captivating.
It’s hard not to use the word “authenticity” to describe the one who no doubt embellishes her stories a little, but whose exaggerations never break the magic, because the heart of what she tells – a young woman tries to thrive in a world that makes life difficult for him – is purely true.
Christine Morency has only really made a career in humor since 2017 and confided in an interview that she had long doubted her legitimacy, which appears bewildering, as it is so obvious that she was born for the stage. Christine Morency is not a craftsman of cleverly constructed jokes, but a larger-than-life personality, invested with an irresistible charisma, which she knows how to make use of perfectly.
She hears the title of her show, Grace, in the second degree. “The grace is in the decor,” she says, pointing to her golden curtains. But nothing could be further from the truth: Christine Morency has really been touched by the grace of the gods of comedy.
Grace
On tour everywhere in Quebec