Berberian & Dupuy Rock My World

March 7, 2008 on 7:45 pm | In Events, Graphic Novelties, Interviews

Wednesday night, I had the distinct pleasure of heading downtown in NYC to see Charles Berberian and Philippe Dupuy speak about their work and then wrote about it for the Big WU. “Who are Charles Berberian and Philippe Dupuy?” you may be asking. Well, theoretical reader, let me enlighten you.

Berberian and Dupuy are a pair of highly acclaimed French cartoonists best known for their character Monsieur Jean and for their singular working practice of entirely writing and drawing all of their comics together. I have to admit, I wasn’t super familiar with their work before going to the event (which was moderated by the always cool Matt Madden), but after hearing the pair speak, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if their comics are half as engaging and entertaining as the artists are (and from what I’ve read they are) I’m going to be buying everything they’ve had translated to English.

Aside from learning plenty about Berberian and Dupuy’s work and Euro comics in general (I finally know how to pronounce “Angouleme” correctly), I think the best part of the whole event was finding out how funny both artists were. Dupuy (above on the left) was not quite as fluent in English as his partner, but he continually made jokes at his own expense in regards to the language barrier, particularly when performing a silly female voice while reading from their comics. And Berberian had more than a few good zingers about everything from drawing with a giant pencil to endangering babies in film shoots. My favorite bit that didn’t quite fit into my write up was this segment when the partners explained the story behind their Monsieur Jean short Love And The Concierge:

PD: This is a true story. My own concierge, she came with my mail, and she asked me ‘What kind of job are you doing, Mr Dupuy? I don’t understand because you are always at home.’ And you had the same problem at the same time.

CB: I was living with my girlfriend at the time, and she used to have a steady job. She would leave home at 9:00 in the morning. At five past 9:00 or ten past 9:00 Philippe would arrive…

PD: At work! [Laughter]

CB: I could feel that the concierge, she was trying to ask what the hell we were doing upstairs all day long. We never answered. I think she died not knowing.

For anyone wanting to get another take on the event, check out the Satisfactory Comics blog write up, and to purchase some of Berberian and Dupuy’s translated work, visit the home page of their English publisher Drawn & Quareterly. Like now!

– KP