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Born in Paris 1921, interested in the way athletes organize their bodies, and so he attended a college
of physical education. At this college he met Jean-Marie Conty, an international basketball player.
Conty had an interest in theatre, and he set up the school ͞Education through Dramatic
Performance͟. Lecoq taught physical expression at this school in 1947.

After the Second World War Lecoq worked in rehabilitation for the disabled population and made
his first theatre connections between 1945 and 1948. These connections link down to the work of
Jacques Copeau.

Lecoq was one of the four key people of twentieth century mime, that being; Jean-Louis Barrault,
Etienne Decroux, Marcel Marceau and Lecoq. Most of these men link back to the teaching of
Copeau.

Lecoq joined the association of travail et culture, which served as the cultural wing of the French
resistance movement. opening up opportunities in arts for working class people. It was in the
Association that Lecoq was first trained, and began to explore mime. He performed in Chasrtes to
celebrate the return of prisoners of war, and one for the liberation of the city and one for May Day
holiday.

Lecoq did not want to do Brecht was interested in discovering the popular roots of theatre; he
wanted to give a voice and expression to the people. He wanted to explore the basic notions, of
people saying goodbye, people in need. He saw theatre as his political statement.

Lecoq moved to Italy in 1948 where he joined Les Comedians De Grenoble with director Jean Daste.
Here he began to work with masks in Commedia Dell͛arte.

Lecoq was exposed to many theatre forms, and soon began to explore masks, the nature of
movement, and political and emotional commitment to ͚popular͛ theatre forms. In 1948 while
teaching at the University of Padua, Lecoq claims to he discovered ͞le jeu de la Commedia Dell͛arte͟
in the markets of the town. He met a young sculptor and mask maker, Amleto Sartori. Sartori͛s
concept of the neutral mask was originally constructed around Lecoq͛s own face. When Lecoq left
Italy for Paris in 1956, Sartori gave him a full set of leather Commedia masks, that he used until his
death in 1999. Together the pair researched and investigated the relationship between the form and
theatrical function of the mask.

In 1951 Lecoq joined Paulo Grassi and Giorgio Strehler in their commitment to reach working class
audiences. The two men had created the ͞teatro stabile͟ which was known as one of Italy͛s leading
theatres. Lecoq opened a school committed to the pedagogy of movement. He introduced his two
new partners to Sartori and they created together his famous masked production of Goldoni͛s ͞A
servant of Two Masters͟
Lecoq directed and choreographed in many different styles but focussed on Greek tragedy,
pantomime and commedia. Myra Felner stated that ͞he was searching for the roots of movement in
theatre.͟

Lecoq met Dario Fo in Milan and in 1952 the created a couple of satirical and political reviews. Fo
received a Nobel prize in literature for his work as a writer, director and performer, talking about
very political issues. The two men stated ͞the world had to be made all over again, there were no
more rules, we had to make the game again, find new rules.͟ Lecoq͛s views reveal that artists
should empower themselves to invent afresh the rules of their particular creative work.

It is important that Lecoq and Fo are placed in the context of the Second World War, need for
cultural, social and political renewal.

It was in 1956 that Lecoq founded his Paris school; his school was his laboratory, his students the
subjects of his experiments. Italy provided the framework and context for the questions he
continued to pose from his base in Paris.

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͞in life I want students to be alive; on stage I want them to be artists͟

͞I am only there to place obstacles in your path so you can find your own way around them͟

Lecoq ran a school of mime and theatre based on movement and the human body. The theatre
belonged to the pupils and their ideas, their quest. The school always moved in Paris, from one less
than satisfactory place to another. This experience helped Lecoq formulate his thoughts on the
relationship between space, movement and creative discovery. ͞I tried to create theatre using the
rules of sport, jealousy, for example, within the parameters of a basketball court... this was theatre
ball͟

In 1976 Lecoq found a permanent home, in what was an ex-gymnasium, then a ruin with no power,
changing rooms or toilets. There was only a small nondescript plaque to suggest the school at ͞Le
central͟. It as in an area which was a good place for a school devoted to exploring nature as well as
culture, best possible site to enjoy the heightened emotions of melodrama or the plebeian
camaraderie of the Greek chorus. The school explored the philosophical assumptions which
remained more or less constant over forty three years. School engaged with ͚dramatic creation͛
rather than merely realising the theatrical edicts of other masters. It was concerned with the
͞theatre to be created͟.

Lecoq had a small team of other tutors that worked alongside him. Entry into the school͛s two year
course required presentation of a satisfactory curriculum vitae and a teachers reference, which
testified applicants movement and acting ability, or at least potential. Would take 100 students
every September. At the end of the first year a group of about 35- 40 students was selected to
progress to the next year. Was based on who was ͞open͟ enough to benefit from a further year at
the school, and the school stressed that it was not a reflection of quality, success or failure, and that
perhaps the students no longer needed the school.
From 1977 Lecoq launched LEM, (laboratory study of movement) where he focused on the dramatic
potential of objects and materials and the spatial relationship between them. ͞the dynamic of
colours, their movement, their texture, their speed... and their relationship with the body and
human passions͟ (p
) Lecoq once got this class to construct balsa wood models that sought to
capture and express the dynamic of the relationship between particular objects in space. LEM is still
a significant part of the school today.

From the late 50͛s Lecoq was a movement director for BBC production of Prokofiev͛s
 
  worked with the opera in Rome, directed Mayakovski͛s in Berlin, choreographed for
Les Ballets Contemporains in Lille, and regularly produced and choreographed Greek tragedies at
Syracuse in Sicily.

At his school he offered a master class every four years, where he communicated and shared his
experiences and discoveries of the previous period. He ran workshops all over the world, running a
two week mime school in London and performing   
  at Queen Elizabeth
hall. He also performed this in China, Australia, Japan, and North America. In 1990 he taught a LEM
master class in Glasgow.

Today the school continues to accept students, clearly the school will continue to change and
experiment.

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Actor training is arguably the most important development in modern western theatre making.
(Hodge 2000:1)

The rise of the influential theatre director, the influence of modern science and psychology on
performing arts and growing interest in Eastern dramatic forms and their training regimes has
occurred from the 20th century. Lecoq is not different from other key innovators in that they share
wider territories of intellectual interest, trying to shift and redefine the parameters and possibilities
of what constituted theatre and what its purpose should be. If the rationale for the models of actor
training had been simply to help the student actor deliver text more persuasively, our interest would
be limited.

Actor training proposes answer to some questions:

-Y What kinds of relationship are possible between performers and spectators?

-Y Where do boundaries between theatre and other art forms or cultural practices begin and
end?
-Y What sorts of metaphors are useful to express the essence of the particular approach to
training?
-Y What is the relationship between the actor͛s body and the actor͛s mind, and, indeed, is it
helpful to pose these two as separate entities, the former ͚directing͛, or controlling, the
latter?
-Y How does the model of training understand the body and its construction?
 -Y Is the attempt to define and create a universal language of theatre either possible or
desirable?
-Y How does the training regime acknowledge, deal with, and utilise (for performance) notions
of the ͚conscious͛ and ͚unconscious͛ mind?
-Y To what extent does the idea of, and quest for ͚presence͛, have and validity in a programme
of actor training?
-Y How far does the training model seek to engage with issues and ideas beyond performance
and theatre?

When interrogating the work of a visionary teacher, there is balance between locating their practice
in a wider historical context and grasping the extent to which their ideas make genuinely new
formulations.

It is often difficult to assume who was significant in shaping Lecoq͛s thinking as he offers few clues in
his writing as to which other historical figures he either admired, or had little time for.

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The school thrived from two things, the increasing production of a strong visual dimension where
actor͛s bodies signify as much as words spoken and wider preoccupations with the body in aspects
of pop culture. Lecoq was a central figure in movement of using a performer͛s  body more than
spoken text. He saw body and its movement through space as the crucial generator of meaning and
significance in contemporary theatre. Movement drew influence from dance, theatre and visual arts;
it cared little for traditional boundaries of differing art forms. This use of the body is often labelled
͚physical theatre͛, used to signpost a significant increase in performance work that privileges actor͛s
body.

Other traditions have also shaped the phenomena of physical movement; live art, circus, vaudeville,
street performing and French mime tradition some of these. It is superficial to regard physical
theatre as on outcome of cultural formations. In the western world, literacy has been downgraded in
favour of the visual form of new theatre. The significance of Jacques Lecoq is largely ignored and
marginalised in most accounts of modern drama because of this view. The increase in the theatre
form has been noted, but why?

Lecoq states  

 
 
   
 
  
     
 

 
       
   


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He suggests cyclical patterns, where speaking theatre exhausts itself. In the UK this is prevalent,
where reliance on text based theatre, requires ͚catching up͛

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Drama is analysed a model that speaks of theatre and society, as opposed to theatre in society.
Theatre ͚picks up tremors below the social surface, alerting audiences to dangers which may remain
latent of actually erupt͛. (Shevtsova) It is further said that theatre IS one of those tremor in society. It
is inadequate to say physical theatre is the coincidental consequence of choices. Outside the arena
of theatre, the body has become central of other disciplines. It is examined in sociology, economics,
cultural studies, psychology, health studies and sports science, pop-culture is interested in beauty,
sexual attraction and fitness to an obsessive point. There are two arguments over this trend; one
being that humans find their identity through their body, the other that capitalist is looking for
something else they can sell.

The body is the main bearer of symbolic value for identity, people work on it, decorate it, dress it,
alter it, all to define their own personal identity. There is on the other hand, a market concerned
with altering the perceptions that surround the body, so it becomes tainted by the murky world of
markets and finance capital. The human body speaks of who we are, marks of suffering, happiness,
gender, class, all imprinted on our skin. It is no coincidence that the body has become the focus of
attention in the work of gays, black, or female practitioners, critiquing cultural preconceptions and
prejudices. The body allows us to investigate the unspoken, the forgotten, and the silenced.


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Lecoq sought to relate to his students as ͞nobody. I am a neutral point through which you must pass
in order to better your own theatrical voice. I am only there to place obstacles in your path, so that
you can better find your way around them.͟ Lecoq insisted that his students develop a personal
voice, rather than imitating their teacher. On the thirtieth anniversary of the school, he hung a
banner saying ͞don͛t do what I do, do what you do͟. Despite his not wanting to be like a guru, his
students saw him this was due to his intellectual leadership and personality, ex-student Andy crook
stated ͞he did seem all knowing and all seeing, he said think for yourselves. Don͛t devalue
yourselves. What great gurus do is offer questions, they don͛t provide answers. A guru throws it
back at you. That͛s exactly what Jacque Lecoq did.͟ At his school there was a fine line between
respect for authority and fear of criticism. Lecoq stated ͞I remain simply amongst the motors that
make things happen͟. He was not concerned with end result as much as whether the student found
most effective way to make a performance. He never confused role of teacher and director.

He saw the actor as not the interpreter, but the creator. He did study texts such as tragedy and
melodrama ͞in our way of working, we enter a text through the body. We never sit around and
discuss... My teaching steers clear of any interpretation, concentrating on the constant respect for
the internal dynamics of the text, avoiding all 

readings͟. He developed an in depth
examination process of how things work. Lecoq; ͞unlike short courses, after which everyone kisses,
sheds tears and promises to meet again, the school if a place of struggle, of tension and crises, out of
which creativity is sometimes stimulated.͟


   


He uses language and metaphors to explain his ideas, when interviewed; he employs language which
is richly littered with metaphor and analogy. ͚In the course of the first few years we shall have
planted the roots, enriched the soil, turned over the earth. We shall have three journeys.͟ Lecoq͛s
use of journey as a metaphor is repeated and significant, it is never ending, no closure or conclusion
in the learning or developmental process encountered by the students. It echoes the title of his
lecture   
  . He believed that students could project contemporary
concerns onto an imaginary realm which is of global significance. His use of journey leads us back to
his experiences as a young man, reaching maturity immediately after WW2, as well as a
commitment to internationalism.

^



    

He has no time to create a cosy atmosphere of mutual support, he works hard, and his students do it
with pleasure. He always focussed on student interest, in the student rebellions of 1968, many of his
students refused to work, claiming they wanted to teach themselves so he said ͞every day for an
hour you teach yourselves͟. He called in  "

. This became central in the curriculum, and a
defining school characteristic, demanding teaching tool, students had 90 minutes a day to produce a
weekly performance, allowing them to work collaboratively, and get feedback from tutors. Shapeless
or poorly conceived work was often stopped and critiqued before completion, successful pieces
rewarded for choice in rhythm, observation, play and timing.

Clowns were another subject introduced, while Lecoq was exploring their relationship between
them and
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. Many students saw it as a high point of their education, it allowed
people to come to terms with the more ridiculous, and therefore vulnerable, aspects of their
personality.

Lecoq did listen to his students; ͞They are constantly thrown back on themselves, and have to invent
their own theatre. We may suggest themes, offer advice, stimulate the students by imposing
restraints, but we can never go any deeper until they are engaged by the work. We must hear what
they say without listening too much.͟

͞  

 

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