Posted at 6:00 a.m.
Marc Cassivi : I was wondering if you could give me an update on the effect of the pandemic on the performing arts over the past two years…
Olivier Kemeid : This is no small order!
M.C. : It is a vast program. I notice that there is a lot of discontent at the moment, a kind of fed up and that, especially in the theater world, there are some who almost call for civil disobedience. Where are you in your own thoughts?
okay : It has changed since the announcement of the opening on February 7th. I was part of the grumbling and grumbling! The sudden closure of theaters before the holiday season pushed us to our limits. And when the holidays came back, the lack of a schedule meant that it was no longer possible. There was starting to be a part of the middle that was considering protests. We had comrades who were returning from Paris or Brussels. I myself went to see a show by the Théâtre d’Aujourd’hui which was playing on the Hill [à Paris]. We were very admiring and impressed by the struggle of the theater community in Brussels. The halls were closed by the government, and I think there were thousands in the streets protesting before the equivalent of the Supreme Court overturned the government’s decision and ordered the halls to open.
M.C. : It inspired you…
okay : It has become a social subject. Our comrades there were not afraid to claim the essential dimension of theatre. This is still a fear in Quebec. We are afraid of farting higher than the hole. Obviously, the goal is not to say that we are more important than sick children! It’s fair to remember that we are not a stamp club. The grumbling grew stronger. We each have our drops that make the vase overflow. Me, I confess that it is the day before the announcement of Legault last week, when we were talking about the reopening of restaurants. I hear about a press conference by the minister [Nathalie] Roy, which I find on his Facebook page. She is with the mayor and is delighted with a great announcement for the cultural community. I’m excited because I’m a naïve… And she announces the preservation of Chinatown. It’s a very good thing, you hear me well. It’s just that for me, it was the last straw. And I heard part of the community say: “Bof, nothing is surprising on the part of this minister and this government. »
M.C. : Many of us at that time saw that it would make no sense to open the restaurants, the information that had first been leaked to the media, and not to open the performance halls…
okay : There is no logic. I have always campaigned for a calendar. It’s not up to me to say that we have to open on January 2 as some people were asking for. I don’t have those skills. And even if it is true that I have lost a little confidence in the government, I trust the doctors. When I see doctors failing, I want to listen to them. Just give us an idea of the schedule in advance. Like what Doug Ford is doing in Ontario. It’s made serious when Doug Ford seems to have a stronger cultural sensitivity than that of François Legault! The growl went to his ears. We feel that he is sensitive to that. The next day, there was this announcement, much earlier than expected, and he ended up saying that it would be February 7. It calmed a certain grumbling, including mine. Calming does not mean extinguishing. My room is going to be empty for weeks and it breaks my heart. If I had a calendar, I could have planned a show before six weeks. What is brewing and which is completely legitimate is to say: we will not close. Or if we close, it will be on our own because there is an outbreak in a team. Let us manage that, but closing seems unthinkable to us.
M.C. : I still see there a danger of alienating part of the public. We won’t blame artists for being rebellious, but some will say: we too make sacrifices, we listen to public health, we listen to doctors, but we don’t suddenly decide that we don’t listen more. What do you think ?
okay : It depends on the context. If the dead pile up and we are faced with the collapse of the hospital system, we will understand. But if it is still a kind of government whim, I would dare say symbolic, that is to say that if for the government, what we are doing is something like a gathering in a shows, we will not understand. No matter how much we tell them that it has nothing to do with a spontaneous gathering of truckers and that the halls are safe places, they don’t hear it. The other thing is that our Minister of Culture comes more from the television world and that filming has never stopped. For this government, artists who have a certain value, that is to say who appear on TV, work. It may have come awkwardly – but the words have meaning – from the mouth of the Dr Boileau: it’s “entertainment”, and so it can wait.
M.C. : The government regards TV as an essential service, and the performing arts as entertainment…
okay : That’s what hurts. We feel at the back of the pack. The minister was not alongside Legault for the announcements. When we reopened, I didn’t see her in theaters. There is a whole symbolic weight that is missing. She corrected the situation a little, Nathalie Roy, saying that it was clumsy, that she does not consider it entertainment, that it is the soul of a people. We can see that she didn’t have the choice anyway to do damage control. I would say that our fight is also to remember the essential dimension of what we do. In this sense, I think we have the support of a good part of the population, who are also aware that we have had it in the dash for two years. With restaurateurs, we are among the circles that have suffered the most. Obviously, we will not make the hierarchy of misfortunes and I would never dare to compare what we are experiencing with what health personnel can experience. But all the same, the live performance sector has eaten a whole lot. The grumbling also comes from the fact that it has created so many inequalities. Those who worked a lot as actors, in dubbing, in TV, in the cinema, got through the crisis correctly. And those who did not work much work even less.
M.C. : I’m probably more cynical than you, but I sometimes wonder if there isn’t something downright strategic about this government suggesting that the performing arts are not a priority. Because that’s probably what the base of his electorate thinks.
okay : It’s possible. I refused so much, not to politicize – because everything is political –, but to embark on a partisanship by addressing the minister “caquiste” Nathalie Roy. For me, it’s the government. He was democratically elected. It’s complex, because it’s not completely culturally insensitive. We see it in François Legault’s relationship to literature. Nathalie Roy, either she does not have his ear, or the cabinet does not give weight to the Ministry of Culture. We feel the difficulty of putting this on the agenda. But you’re right that it clearly wasn’t a priority. It’s undeniable. Would another more culturally sensitive government have done things differently? Without a doubt. Moreover, at the federal level, aid for artists has been a little faster. It was amazing. Or maybe not so surprising… [rires]
M.C. : At the moment, the Essential Living Arts Collective is asking for no more and no less than a permanent show. Some will say that truckers are criticized for being intransigent, for only thinking about their freedom, so why should an exception be made for artists? It can be retrieved easily from the right.
okay : Yes, it can be slippery. There are professional associations that criticize these artists for creating bickering and not speaking with one voice. Because strategically, you have to have a unanimous voice. But at the same time, it’s not healthy in a democracy to have only one voice. The artists felt so left behind. There were not many dialogues, and the dialogues went through institutions and professional associations. It’s normal. Me, I have the chance, via the Quat’Sous, to be a little more informed. I try to convey the information. But when you’re an actor at home, it’s so hard to get info. The money is given to the institutions, so afterwards, to trickle it down to the artists, it’s complex and it takes a long time. It created some really understandable frustration. There is a growl that is healthy. Among young people, it is no longer grumbling, it is despair. They come out of school, they submit a project and they have the impression that we will have colonized Mars before it is realized, 2025 is so far away.