Tradition often brings people to the tombs for All Saints Day. An event that is not funny, except for this cemeteries guide: Thierry Le Roi, 62, knows more than 200 in the world, those of Paris like his pocket. For 25 years, he has organized his “necropolitan safaris” with his air of Fernandel, his very erudite banter and his somewhat dark humor.
In Nantes, as a kid in the 60s and 70s, Thierry Le Roi crosses the cemetery of Miséricorde for compulsory visits to his great-aunt. It bores him, except for the syrup which awaits him there on his return. Bac pro nearby, he landed in Paris in 1981. Chance lodged him next to Père Lachaise. A few years later, he travels to Egypt, with a guide who offers his clients to walk around, eyes closed, in a crypt, and he tells stories. On his return to Paris, he rushes to see the pioneer of funeral tourism: a certain Vincent de Langlade.
Père Lachaise had three million visitors a year, but at the time it was deserted. So he launches into all-out research, he begins theme visits: Belgians, poets, princes… He sticks to the dates. Today, he finished with the monument to the dead, inaugurated on November 1, 1899, in the main alley, a stone’s throw from Félix Faure. It is a monument of Albert Bartholomé which caused a scandal, because there were nudes.
Thierry Le Roi remains vigilant in the face of certain rather specific requests from visitors – to prevent this place of contemplation from becoming a fair. “I have a family who asked me if their children could come dressed up for Halloween.says the guide. People don’t realize it’s still a working cemetery. Of course, it’s a living space… We’re having a music festival, but I’m asking the curator for permission.”
He has an eye for unearthing the small changes in this living place: the 4,000 trees of Père Lachaise, the names of Proust’s family regilded for his 100th birthday, the potatoes placed on the edge of Parmentier’s tomb – the one hash! – or pencils for Tignous. One day, he notices a small pyramid and, surprised, sees a man coming out of it, several weekends in a row. He ends up introducing himself: the man is a pharmacist, single and has taken it into his head to prepare his burial by painting frescoes inside like the pharaohs. Five years of work that Thierry Le Roi has filmed and shows on video to his clients.
“And me, if I tell you that I don’t want to rest at Père Lachaise, are you disappointed?swings the guide, hilarious. I don’t think about it too much. I’m scared of death and the problem is that you can’t buy anything while you’re alive. My love would be to show my grave because, once I’m inside, there’s not too much interest!” Before adding “If I spend eternity at Père Lachaise, I would like the CV ‘Passeur de mémoire’ to be written and, on the slab, the plan of the cemetery to be engraved with a point indicating: ‘You are here ‘.”