Philippe Gaulier

Early life and education

Gaulier was born in occupied Paris on 4 March 1943 to a doctor, his father, and a Spanish mother. He grew up at 16 Rue de la Croix-Faubin, near a circus and opposite the former Petite Roquette prison, where stones in the pavement marked the site of the guillotine. His father, a general practitioner, told his children that looking at the stones "would be good" so that "they will not be idiots" and "will follow the rules of the society." Gaulier called his father "a bourgeois idiot" and described himself as "the rebel" of his family, adding: "I never been conservative." He attributed his sense of humour to his mother: "My father hated my jokes, but not my mother. She was my first spectator. And my first spectator thought I am a genius. So I carried on, because of my mother."

At 8 years old he was kicked out of school for punching his gymnastics teacher; he stated that he did not regret this as the instructor made students march as though they were in the army. Gaulier studied under Jean Vilar and Alain Cuny as a member of the Théâtre National Populaire. He had an ambition to be a tragic actor, but said he was laughed at every time he attempted to do serious work in drama school. He then began a class with Jacques Lecoq who trained him in clowning, improvisation, and mask work.

Early career

Throughout the 1970s, Gaulier had a famous clown act with Pierre Byland, which they performed extensively in Paris at the Odéon Théâtre de l'Europe and toured internationally. One clown show in particular, Les Assiettes, in which Gaulier and Byland broke 200 plates every night, became a legendary hit in Paris. Gaulier directed the show in collaboration with Roger Blin, director of the original productions of Waiting for Godot and Endgame by Samuel Beckett. Gaulier recalled that the Parisian theatre world at the time was preoccupied with the philosophy of Bertolt Brecht: "Us, we wanted to do the best idiot show in the world."

During the 1970s, Gaulier taught alongside Lecoq at L'École Internationale de théâtre Jacques Lecoq, where he disagreed with Lecoq's pedagogy and teaching style. Gaulier had never intended to become a teacher — "I was more or less a child of May '68... always I thought the teachers, they are like police" — and began teaching only because Lecoq asked him to: "I admired Jacques Lecoq. And I said yes." In 1980, after a decade of growing differences, Gaulier left to open his own school, École Philippe Gaulier, in Paris. When asked about pedagogical differences with Lecoq, Gaulier responded, "I did not want to accept his style, I did not like it. So after 10 years there I said, 'I'm going to do my own school.' If you see my students, you'll also see they have so many different styles that you can't say they come from Philippe Gaulier's school. I am happy with that. I don't give a style to my students. I want to give freedom, not my style."

École Philippe Gaulier

In 1980, Gaulier opened École Philippe Gaulier, in Paris. The school received financial backing by Françoise Dolto and Madeline Milhaud, wife of Darius Milhaud. In 1991, Arts Council of England invited Gaulier to move the École Philippe Gaulier to London, in the neighborhood of Cricklewood, in the United Kingdom, where it was based for eleven years until 2002. Sacha Baron Cohen attended the school around 1996. After Lecoq's death in 1999, Gaulier's reputation grew larger as his school continued to take students.

In 2005, the school reopened back in Sceaux, Hauts-de-Seine, until 2011, when it moved again, this time to Étampes, where it opened in summer 2011. Organized by Small Nose Productions, Gaulier returned to the UK once a year to run workshops at Trestle Arts Base in St Albans, Herts.

Gaulier always specified he offered training in theatre and not comedy. At the school, Gaulier taught classes in "le jeu", clown, bouffon, Shakespeare, Chekhov, Molière, Feydeau, melodrama, mask play, neutral mask, Greek tragedy, characters, Commedia dell'arte, and vaudeville.

The BBC show Newsnight covered Gaulier in 2015. In 2015, Rachel Weisz credited her Gaulier training as an influence on her performance in the Yorgos Lanthimos film The Lobster. That same year, Cal McCrystal reported to the BBC that he, "knew of no greater performance teacher ever". In 2016 The Guardian reported that "'Gaulier-trained' [was] a buzzword on many a comic's publicity". The New York Times reported in 2022 that Gaulier's "stature has grown in recent years". In 2026, Simon McBurney wrote that Gaulier "changed his life" and that Gaulier was known for offering something you could not get elsewhere. Also in 2026, Hong Kong film actor Anthony Wong claimed Gaulier "exploded his idea of what acting could be".

In 2022, Hillary Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton traveled to Paris and interviewed Gaulier for their Apple TV+ series Gutsy.

The school temporarily closed for the COVID-19 pandemic, and reopened in autumn 2020 for a delayed 40th anniversary in 2021. In 2022, Gaulier began to teach fewer classes and travel less, considering retirement, which he previously said he had no plans for. In 2023, Gaulier retired from teaching. For the school's 43rd Anniversary, École Philippe Gaulier was recognized with an award for "meritorious services in cultivating artists". In 2026, NPR reported classes at the school are now being taught by Gaulier's former assistants, graduates of the school whom he trained prior to his 2023 retirement.

Pedagogy

In Gaulier's view of performance, the performer must feel pleasure to be performing, having "complicité" (the art of being present and connected with your audience or partner). Pillars in Gaulier's teaching are "humanity, complicité, and play". By humanity, Gaulier means "a light delicacy, vulnerability, and an almost childlike openness that reveals our fears and tenderness". His methodology of teaching was designed to allow students to develop their own strengths, following specific principles but no defined method. Gaulier resisted the characterisation of his teaching as a method: "It's not a method. It's just if you fail, and you are happy to fail, it's to discover something else." According to The Observer, "Gaulier taught theatre through the essence of being a clown: there were no oversized shoes or undersized cars in sight, but instead the search for a raw humanity rooted in what he called the pleasure to be on stage." He did not emphasize technique or physical virtuosity, and suggested these traits in a performer will become boring, unexciting, and disconnecting to an audience. Gaulier much preferred to see students find their complicité on stage through failure, fear, and panic, rather than assured technique.

In this sense he tried not to leave his own mark on his students, stating that he "hate[d] the idea of lots of little Gauliers going out into the world". This approach notably differs from that of his teacher, the famous late master bouffon Jacques Lecoq, who is seen by some as a guru of modern movement-based theatre. "You can always tell a Lecoq student", Gaulier stated in 2001. "Too much emphasis on image." Gaulier was critical of movement-based theatre, saying of Marcel Marceau, "he's a maniac with his gestures". He was much more interested in impulse than movement analysis. However, both Gaulier and Lecoq stressed the importance of a performer's unique, individualistic connection with their audience.

To Gaulier the essence of clowning was to "find your idiot". When asked what he looked for in students on stage, he replied: "The eyes. He has the eyes of game or he has the eyes of funeral." He told his students to wear red noses because, he said, "when a student puts one on, I see better how he was when he was a child". He was highly critical of different dramatic theorists including Stanislavski and Grotowsky, writing, "We want to see actors enjoying themselves. We are not interested that you just buried your grandmother." Similarly, Gaulier held disdain for "the military, the church, hypocrisy, sham, inauthenticity, politicians, academics, and fascists," according to The Guardian. Gaulier wrote, "the theoreticians of the theatre (except Meyerhold and Brecht) are all minus habens who prowl around universities hoping to hear a faint echo of their mental masturbations". Conversely, on the purpose of his teaching, Gaulier specified, "I hope I try to teach freedom. I hope. We never know exactly what we teach."

Alumni

École Philippe Gaulier has educated numerous notable alumni.

Graduates have gone on to receive multiple Academy Awards, Emmy Awards, Tony Awards, BAFTA Awards, Golden Globe Awards, SAG Awards, European Film Awards, César Awards, Olivier Awards, David di Donatello Awards, AACTA Awards, Lumière Awards, Goya Awards, Hong Kong Film Awards, Golden Horse Awards, Magritte Awards, Nastro d'Argento Awards, Molière Awards, Evening Standard Awards, Drama Desk Awards, Obie Awards, Edinburgh Comedy Awards, and the Europe Theatre Prize. As well as top prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, Venice Film Festival, and the Berlinale.

Personal life and death

Gaulier was married to Michiko Miyazaki, a former student and colleague.

Alain Gheerbrant, Françoise Marthouret, and Sacha Baron Cohen penned prefaces to Gaulier's books.

Gaulier died on 9 February 2026, at the age of 82, due to complications from a lung infection.

On 18 February 2026, Gaulier's funeral was held at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. The Observer reported the "unconventional wake" had students in attendance "leaving flowers, red noses, and even a banana on his coffin."

At Gaulier's wake, The Man Who Waits for Freedom, a documentary film made in collaboration with Gaulier and Michiko Miyazaki Gaulier prior to his death, was screened for the first time. The title had been chosen by Gaulier himself. The film includes classroom footage, interviews with former students, and Gaulier's reflections on life and teaching. Subsequently, the school published the film online, describing it as "his last present". In the film, Gaulier offered a final message to his students: "Don't follow the teacher too much. Listen to the teacher... yes, but your passion, your life, your fun, your humour – it's your secret. So follow this secret."

In popular culture

Zach Galifianakis has stated that Gaulier and his school inspired his TV show Baskets.

Hillary Clinton and Chelsea Clinton interviewed Gaulier for the first episode of their Apple TV+ series, Gutsy. In the episode, Hillary Clinton also participated in a clown class. Videos of Clinton interviewing Gaulier went viral on social media.