“That, Dominic, is absolutely true,” calls Véronique Cloutier to her journalist, who is sitting next to him in the back of the small Fenplast room.
Posted at 7:00 am.
We are in Longueuil on April 26th, for the second year in a row her husband’s first solo exhibition, who then takes the spotlight and tells of a particularly painful night when he had to ask his wife to help him put his shoulder back in place Location constantly shifting, an increasingly humiliating anecdote as the story shifts into a…toilet bowl.
For a long time, Louis Morissette told himself that he would sleep after his death. But one day a doctor told him that the hearing in his left ear, from which he could no longer hear, would probably never return. Worse, if he continued driving at top speed, he risked losing his hearing on his right side, a tragedy for anyone and even more so for anyone making a career in the world of communications. Conclusion: If you don’t want to sleep forever, you should take a long nap.
Aside from the controversies he returns to in Under Pressure, this is undoubtedly the most disturbing, even disturbing, thing about this show: the extent to which the comedian stubbornly refused to listen to his body, which was wracked with excruciating aches and pains (including an acute case). of bruxism) symptomatic of a phenomenal inability not to constantly work, work, work.
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Louis Morissette
“It is certain that my sister has a disability [Eve, qui vit avec la paralysie cérébrale] “That immediately contributed to me seeing rest as a weakness because I was always aware of the privilege that comes with walking,” the Drummondville resident admits in his office at KOTV, the television production company he founded in 2011.
On the wall: a large black-and-white photo of his wife and three children, soccer memorabilia and a poster highlighting the 250,000 tickets sold for Morissette, the popular tour that traveled across the province from 2014 to 2019.
After the cancellation of the Morissette II tour, announced before the pandemic and then repeatedly postponed, Véronique Cloutier proposed to her lover to finally realize the old dream of a solo show that he had been carrying with him since leaving the National School of the Humor in 1996.
The McGill University graduate in marketing and international business had registered there, like others, taking a trip to Europe for one last luxury before entering the priesthood of adult life. Or, in his case, before he took over the management of his father’s company, Venmar Ventilation. Which in the end never happened because the laughter was louder than anything else.
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Louis Morissette
Proud of running shoes
As early as 2010, Louis Morissette had tried a few numbers, alone at the microphone, at various comedy evenings, in bars where he was accompanied by his wife, whose “wisdom” and openness, as he says, have always benefited him. “But the two or three attempts he made brought nothing special to the landscape of humor,” she recalled in an interview. It was a rising for the sake of rising, it was not embodied. »
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Veronique Cloutier
A criticism that is difficult to level at Under Pressure, a show that no other comedian could present, to the extent that no other comedian shares his daily life with one of the most famous presenters in Quebec and that no other comedian is at war with the boss of Quebecor. Such is the reckless bet of this disclosure, in which Morissette strives to touch the universal by not erasing anything that is not at all universal in her life.
As a reminder, in 2003, Louis Morissette signed a sketch for Ceci n’est pas un bye bye, inspired by A Man and His Sin, in which he translated the couple Pierre Karl Péladeau and Julie Snyder into the costumes of Séraphin Poudrier and Donalda. A parody that the press tycoon recorded with little self-irony.
Early 2004, the comic book guy At the same time, he learned that the host of the TVA reality show “For Better or Worse” had been taken away from him. Almost 20 years later, the conflict between Pierre Karl Péladeau and Louis Morissette, although less violent, is still unresolved and KOTV has never collaborated with a Quebecor branch.
Does Louis Morissette still have a grudge against the PKP? “I don’t know if I blame him, but I’m definitely proud. Véro has often told me that I am proud of running shoes. »
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Louis Morissette
In fact, I can’t blame him because he brought out the best in me. He continues to look for the best in me. It is thanks to him that I managed to build a healthy and successful company like KO with my team. Without him, I don’t know if I would have had the same fire.
Louis Morissette
The producer admits to having negotiated the many chapters of this conflict with arrogance – he is not afraid to add a layer of it to his show – but still hopes for a détente. “I called his office [situé à quelques coins de rue du sien, au centre-ville de Montréal], I told his team that any time he has a canceled appointment or a hole at the end of the day, I want us to talk like gentlemen. But I was told: “Forget it, he doesn’t want to see you.” »
Would you really go there, Louis? “I would definitely go. Life is too short. »
Running like idiots
Louis Morissette also recalls in “Under Pressure” the stratospheric failure of his VIP show and the media soap opera that caused Bye bye in 2008. The Journal de Montréal accuses the couple of everything wrong and points out that some of the sketches in this edition of the year-end meeting were undeniably of questionable taste, which their creators admitted.
Isn’t there a risk in reopening these secret files?
PHOTO DOMINICK GRAVEL, THE PRESS
Louis Morissette
Probably, but the answer is that I don’t care because being in the truth, understanding why I feel this way today is the DNA of what I wanted to do, and I couldn’t do it without too talk about these crucial moments in my journey.
Louis Morissette
But Morissette emphasizes that everyone can recognize their own setbacks in these events, which don’t happen to everyone. “That’s why I’m afraid that a lot of the interviews I give will emphasize the fact that I’m talking about my life, when in fact I’m talking about life,” he says.
“On the show I wonder why we walk around like idiots all the time. Are you really for the rest of us or, in my case, to show that I’m not just the right boyfriend, to show my father that I wasn’t wrong, to follow my own plan, to show that I had my place? »