Marcel Marceau, the great French mime who for seven decades mastered silence and brought new life to an ancient art form, has died. He was 84. Marceau died Saturday in Paris, French news media reported, citing his former assistant Emmanuel Vacca. The cause of death was not disclosed.
On Sunday, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon praised Marceau as "the master," saying he had the rare gift of "being able to communicate with each and every one beyond the barriers of language."
Active until late in his life, Marceau toured the world for more than half a century, giving more than 15,000 performances. Each included several pieces featuring Bip, the beloved character he created early in his career. Annette Bercut Lust, author of "From the Greek Mimes to Marcel Marceau and Beyond," said Marceau's mentor, French mime master Etienne Decroux, "reinvented the art of mime to revive modern theater and the actor's art," whereas Marceau "popularized that art and brought it to the whole world."
Starting as a child mimic of Charlie Chaplin, whose Little Tramp character in silent films made him laugh and cry, Marceau by the age of 30 had become the singular embodiment of the ancient art of mime. He also took mime in new directions.
One of the secrets of his success, some critics said, was Marceau's ability to incorporate cinematic techniques into his stories.
He could, as former Los Angeles Times critic Dan Sullivan wrote, present a montage of fleeting moments that defined a character's "age, sex, class, even clothing" that audiences who had been raised seeing the movies could easily follow.
Through the years, Marceau created dozens of adventures for Bip, the dreamy little poet whose white face, ill-fitting striped shirt, too-long pants and smashed hat topped with a jaunty red carnation are perhaps the most familiar image of mime today.
In addition to Bip's adventures, Marceau also created many other "mimodramas," including Gogol's "The Overcoat," the story of a Russian clerk who works for a decade to buy an overcoat, only to have it stolen. He performed innumerable solo sketches, such as "The Creation of the World" and, among his most revered works, one that showed the four stages of life -- youth, maturity, old age and death.
To be a mime, Marceau said, one must be a sculptor, a painter, a writer, a poet and a musician. And one must also have incredible physical stamina and talent. "It's not dance," he said. "It's not slapstick. It is essence and restraint."
