Toulouse. Michel Drucker: “Every day is a gift of life”
At almost 80 years old, Michel Drucker reinvents himself in his second stand-up, “From you to me”. A show of memories, between humor and emotion, where he converses with his 30-year-old double. His tour goes through the Bascala in Bruguières this Saturday, April 9. Meeting with a television “monument” who has come a long way after his open-heart surgery.
Did your health problems make you hesitate to go back on stage?
On the contrary, I wanted this show to be an encouragement for all those who have or will have a health problem. The only concern I had was that my memory wouldn’t be the same. And no, I have a very good memory and the success of my first show boosted me and made me want to continue. I completely rewrote this show in the hospital. Then I worked on it a lot when I was in rehabilitation with my daughter Stéphanie who put me on stage.
In “From you to me”, you rejuvenate, as in the first show?
I appear several times fifty years younger, and this young me interrogates its old double. It’s not a hologram, or morph, or images of me in the past. But I want to leave the surprise to the spectators who will come on Saturday…
It must be unsettling to have a conversation with yourself…
It’s true. Yet I’ve been used to it for six months, but every time I see my 30-year-old double talking to me I get a shock. At the start of the show, he said to me: “but what are you doing here, are you still on TV? You’ve gotten a little old.” I don’t care: “You, on the other hand, with your small figure, your brushing, your elephant leg pants…”. He asks me about my memories, the people I met, my relationship with the public. I wish him a very long career, and I say to him: “work, work, work…”.
How do you remember all these anecdotes?
When I lay in my hospital bed for months, I could only see the ceiling. It was a bit like the screen of my sleepless nights, as Nougaro sang. I thought of lots of people. I invited them on stage. Some that we hear, others that we see in unpublished photos. Claude François, Romy Schneider, Johnny, Delpech, Léon Zitrone, and many others…
Are you nostalgic?
What saddens me is that we forget people who have marked our lives. Next year, I will regularly do programs on people who have disappeared and who I miss like Jean Ferrat, Aznavour, Brel, Balavoine, Michel Berger, Christophe… With time, everything goes to hell, like in the song by Leo Ferre. I regret it and I want to pay tribute to them. As I am the last of my generation, if I don’t do it, no one will.
Has this big health glitch changed?
Oh yes. I came very close to disaster, with a vital prognosis, 10 hours on the pool table, 12 hours of anesthesia. The cardiologists had told me: “we are not sure that you could come back to television. As for the scene, you forget”. I tell myself that every day is a gift of life. I can’t believe that in six months I will be 80 years old and in two years it will be 60 years of career. I started in July 64 for the Olympic Games in Tokyo!
This monumental aspect of unbreakable television, isn’t it heavy?
Me who is not very social networks, I sometimes look at what is said about me in a caricatural way and that amuses me a lot. On stage, I make fun of myself. It’s my way of experiencing this very rare longevity on television.
.What does a Michel Drucker day look like?
I have an extremely organized life. I wake up at half past seven, turn on the radio, drink a big glass of water, go up to my office where I have a small gym and do three-quarters of an hour of abs and of the rower. A nap after lunch and I get back to work. I cycle 10/12 kilometers. In the evening I watch TV a lot, I read the press, I rehearse my show and I go to bed around 11am. I don’t like going out. I have a very strong family, the same woman for 50 years, and half a dozen collaborators who have worked with me for some 50 years.
Do you know who you will be voting for on Sunday?
Yes I made my choice a long time ago. I have aspirations and duties to remember in relation to my family who come from Romania, this region of the world, Eastern Europe, where people have suffered a lot. It continues currently in Ukraine and the images that I see are terrifying. What impresses me the most is the propaganda. I have the feeling that the more sources of information there are, the less informed we are. My parents were naturalized in 1937 under the popular front after seven years of waiting. I can’t forget what they passed on to me.