In his fifth show, Nomo sapiens, Boucar Diouf has fun dissecting the human being, this fascinating species capable of the worst imbecility as well as the greatest finesse of mind. Everyone carries this duality within them, insists the comedian. But we would still tend to believe that Boucar Diouf is more erudite than imbecile. He, in any case, refuses to take the public for a suitcase.
Nomo sapiens is a demanding show in which the biologist and humorist does not hesitate to draw on his scientific knowledge. To make you laugh, but also to make you think. “I don’t know if I do committed humor, but I never do anything disengaged, anyway. I always work on my lyrics so that they dilate the spleen, but also so that they touch the heart. And for them to stimulate the mind maybe eventually. I never go on stage with the simple objective of making people laugh, ”he says.
It is therefore not tomorrow the day before that you will see Boucar Diouf clowning around alongside other comedians in a delirious show like LOL. Who will laugh last? on Prime Video. Histrionics, vulgarity, ease: Boucar Diouf avoids as much as possible. It would never, however, occur to him to look down on those who giggle at a joke below the belt.
“I accept that people may find it funny. I’ll never go there, but hey, it doesn’t hurt anyone. It is diversity that creates resilience in an ecosystem. In other words, we can’t all find the same thing funny. Me, I know, for example, that there are people who are not at all touched by my humor. What I do is really not for everyone. If you don’t like to hear about cousinhood with the great apes, it’s not a good idea to come and see me in a show”, recognizes the one who can also be read in the pages of La Presse+.
Actor of the “rigolocracy”
By confining himself to a very intellectual humor, which some would call intelligent, he knows very well that he has not chosen the easy way. This oceanographer turned comedian “by accident” never had the ambition to become a mainstream laughter star. In recent years, he has distanced himself from the industry. He systematically refuses to participate in game shows and produces his own shows.
” I am like this. I never take the path laid out in advance. I often say to young comedians: everyone takes the highway to go to Quebec, but I prefer to take the 132. The 132, there are plenty of surprises. You discover the flats of the river, the villages… The highway is just a straight line”, he illustrates with his singular colorful language that Quebecers adopted fifteen years ago.
Author, columnist, host: Boucar Diouf has nonetheless taken advantage of the omnipresence of comedians in the public sphere. But today he is more critical of what he calls “rigolocracy”, the dictatorship of laughter. As if, in Quebec, any serious remark had to be diluted with jokes.
“I don’t know why Quebec is such a society that needs to be laughed at. Is it because of the two referendum failures? May be. We are still in search of identity. It’s as if we were still an adolescent society for which laughter is a refuge. Me, I think that we must accept to sometimes have serious discussions without humor ”, analyzes Boucar Diouf, well aware however of being him also involved in the “rigolocracy”.
laugh to forget
Laughter is no less essential, the comedian does not pretend otherwise. During his childhood in Senegal, this was the only way for him to emancipate himself, after contracting polio, which left his right leg paralyzed for life. While his brothers excelled on the soccer field, he was already making the gallery laugh. “Behind each person who laughs hides a suffering that we try to forget. Me, it’s my leg, ”he confesses with hindsight.
With Nomo sapiens — whose title is a contraction of “nono” and “homo sapiens” (intelligent man) — Boucar Diouf uses humor to talk about climate change which, when treated seriously, makes him anxious, even cynical, even him. , the eternal optimist. The passivity of governments exasperates him. To believe that the stupidity of man takes over his ability to achieve great things.
I don’t know why Quebec is such a society that needs to be laughed at. Is it because of the two referendum failures? May be.
Is evolution a regression? “The problem is that we humans define what evolution is. When you do the intelligence ranking, you don’t put yourself at the bottom! But if you asked caribou, I’m not sure humans would come out on top. We are still the only animal which has only one planet and which destroys it without being able to stop. »
Better to laugh than cry, indeed.