From greed to pride to envy, gluttony and laziness, Christian Bégin, who hasn’t performed a comedy show for 25 years, presented his brand new solo project “Les 8 deadly sins” on Wednesday night at the Outremont Theater, during his return to Montreal.
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“Embodiment of everything that should be silent” because it is a fifty-year-old white, heterosexual, cisgender and privileged Christian Bégin, who does not refuse anything, has admitted that he is in a “strange timing to make a” return “”.
Apparently overwhelmed by the social advances of the last quarter century – such as consensus and the concept of micro-aggression – the 59-year-old artist nevertheless managed to demonstrate the relevance of his words in the humorous landscape of Quebec, having fun deconstructing this generalized image of the 50-year-old white, heterosexual, cisgender and privileged.
Ticking “all the boxes of happiness” for his position as a privileged white man – stature he refers to on many occasions – but also for his IGA avatar in his effigy, happiness doesn’t rain so often in his court, he argues. His “transit of shit” that will one day get the better of his voice “so much that battery acid belches” and the hair that grows and regrows in abundance in unexpected places with age is nothing enviable in the eyes of others, he affirmed.
It is in these more intimate windows that the presenter and the actor opened up on his life and his daily life, and in these moments of self-irony that he was most effective. A few simple and predictable gags, “dad jokes”, certain lengths and inequalities of tone, however, overshadowed the show, directed by Chantal Lamarre.
The audience, for its part, warmly encouraged the comedian in this third solo show which allowed him to revisit the seven deadly sins, which he says embodied in the playbill, as well as establishing an eighth which he kept secret until the end of his presentation.
Christian Bégin will present his “8 Deadly Sins” Thursday and Friday in Montreal at the Outremont Theater and at the Salle Albert-Rousseau in Quebec next Tuesday.
