Yvon Deschamps
Inspired by Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant, Deschamps made his first real monologue part of the review when Robert Charlebois did not want to learn his lines for the dialogue (he decided to strum the guitar instead).
), Deschamps played a naïve worker extolling the great generosity and good-heartedness of his boss, making it clear that reality was not quite so rosy: Deschamps would write a number of other monologues, including Le monde sont malades (People are Crazy), C'est extraordinaire (That's Really Something), and La Saint-Jean (June 24), as well as Nigger Black and Pépère (Grandpa), both of which went back to the character's childhood.
In 1969 he presented L'argent (Money) as the opening act for singer Marie Laforêt's tour, then Le bonheur (Happiness) at the Théâtre du Canada; these two monologues would become his second album.
In 1970 Deschamps released his third album, Le p'tit Jésus/Le fœtus (Baby Jesus/The Foetus) and appeared more than 240 times at the Place des Arts's Théâtre Maisonneuve, where he launched monologues like Dans ma cour (In My Yard) and Cable TV.
In 1971 he had a film role in Jean Bissonnette's Hold on to Daddy's Ears (Tiens-toi bien après les oreilles à papa).
It would be the swan song of the most fruitful period of his career: seeing a new generation of Québécois comedians like Ding et Dong growing up around him, and troubled by what he saw as a political correctness movement in the 1980s, Deschamps chose 1983 to bow out as a monologuist with his farewell show, Un voyage dans le temps (A Journey Through Time).
Among the characters he developed there was the famous storyteller persona of Ti-Blanc Lebrun who would swallow his harmonica before the end of every story and be unable to continue.
The experience of weekly television allowed Deschamps, now in his 50s, to keep a hand in the comedy business and stay in touch with Quebec audiences, but with a much lower level of stress than his one-man shows had involved.
Following the show's success he moved into semi-retirement, purchasing in 1996 the Manoir Rouville-Campbell, a historic hotel property, a Tudor Manor, in Mont-Saint-Hilaire in Quebec's Montérégie region.
Following pressure from contemporaries and friends, such as wife Judi Richards and Normand Brathwaite, who were adamant that his newer material should be shared with larger audiences, Deschamps got back to work.
), was performed in front of sold-out houses in the Manoir, at Montreal's Théâtre Corona and Quebec City's Palais Montcalm, then hit the road for a cross-Quebec tour in 2001 and 2002, culminating in the Comment ca, 2000... 2001... 2002?
As one of the most prolific hosts and performers the 'Festival Juste pour rire' has ever had, he presented one new or re-worked monologue for each gala show for the festival's 25th anniversary in the summer of 2007.
In Nigger Black, for instance, the character recalled boyhood surprise upon learning that "Nègres" were no more nor less than human beings like him, neither better nor worse: But, very quickly, Deschamps felt the need to go further outside the usual boundaries.
The monologue started quietly, after a long introduction and a song (On va s'en sortir, We'll Manage), with the character warning the public against the dangers of intolerance, which had caused wars, massacres, genocides and other human follies—all that, punctuated with a diatribe against "faggots".
The monologue continued to unwind, and the character would explain how he had kicked a Jewish family out of their neighbourhood as a teenager, punctuated by exclamations of "damn dirty Jews".
Deschamps' character would add that an army should really be mounted against the intolerants, ending the monologue with the sounds of a regiment marching, fading into a reprise of the opening song, On va s'en sortir.
