In 1948, he staged A Season in Hell from the poem by Arthur Rimbaud, with Akakia-Viala [fr] and received a prize for avant-garde young theater companies.
The play was initially a public and critical failure, but he resumed it starting on 11 May 1957 at La Huchette, thanks to the growing success of its author and the financial support of Louis Malle.
He remained the lifeblood of La Huchette until his death, more than half a century after introducing Eugène Ionesco to the public, and he performed the role of Monsieur Martin until June 2007, before a total of more than one million five hundred thousand spectators.
He was also interested in musicals, staging Twist Appeal with Vince Taylor in 1962, the works of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, then Offenbach, tu connais ?
In addition, he played a protagonist of Jean Dréville's film Normandie-Niémen [fr] and one of the manual laborers in Jacques Tati's Mon Oncle.