Playwright, screenwriter, librettist and teacher Michel Marc Bouchard is one of the winners of the 2023 Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards (PGGAS).
We owe the imagination and sensitivity of the 65-year-old to plays such as Les Feluettes – a flagship work of Canadian drama -, Les Muses orphelines, L’histoire de l’oie, The Great Heat, Tom on the Farm”, “Christine the Queen Boy” and “The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up”, all of which were accepted on the small or big screen. Such is the case of Laurier Gaudreault, a five-hour series produced by his friend Xavier Dolan and available on Club illico.
Michel Marc Bouchard’s works have been translated into twenty languages and performed all over the world. He also wrote two opera librettos, Les Feluettes with music by Kevin March and La beauté du monde with music by Julien Bilodeau.
Pride and Velvet
Born in 1958 in Saint-Coeur-de-Marie, Lac-Saint-Jean, Michel Marc Bouchard is “proud to receive this prestigious award” which gives him the breath to continue creating. He is currently working on a new play and a third opera planned for next year.
The man who wrote his very first play at the age of 14 works with the “attempt to make the invisible visible” and has never put his pen down since his youth.
When we receive an award, “we always wonder if our career is over,” he told the QMI Agency. “I’m still quite young, which means I find it a form of tremendous appreciation from the environment and the public. This is a very important award.”
Michel Marc Bouchard shares this honor with all those who have helped him to be the artist he is over the decades.
“I was fortunate to be able to work, work and write in one of the most beautiful languages in the world, the French language. This language is rich, polyphonic, diverse and allowed me to explore a wide range of its musicality,” he also emphasizes in the video.
The prolific writer feels like he’s in the midst of a “harvest season” as the industry has recognized his work for a number of years, such as in 2021 when he was awarded the Athanase David Prize for his entire body of literary work.
As he happily accepts all of these awards, he doesn’t fail to thank the actors, directors, theater managers, and directors who made his words shine. “Don’t forget that my job is a collective job, like all performing arts by the way. Alone we are not much, but together it is immense.
The Governor General’s Awards commemorate the “poetic vision both universal and timeless” of Michel Marc Bouchard, who teaches at the National Theater School of Canada. It is emphasized that he “explores human relations, particularly the notion of marginality and the queer universe”.
Michel Marc Bouchard is an Officer of the Order of Canada, Knight of the National Order of Quebec and Companion of Arts and Letters of Quebec. He also won the National Arts Center Prize (PGGAS), the SACD-Paris Francophone Dramaturgy Prize, the Laurent-McCutcheon Prize for his contribution to combating homophobia, and the Gascon-Thomas Prize of the School National Theater for his contribution to Canadian theater.
He will be honored along with others, singer-songwriter KD Lang and soprano and voice teacher Rosemarie Landry, at a gala planned for May 27 at the National Arts Center in Ottawa.