Why Did Marcel Marceau Change His Name?
The stage persona “Bip the Clown” made French actor and mime Marcel Marceau very well known. Mime has been referred to as the “art of silence” by Marceau, who has performed professionally for over 60 years. A Jewish family welcomed Marcel Marceau into the world in Strasbourg, France. Charles Mangel, his father, was a Bdzin,…
The stage persona “Bip the Clown” made French actor and mime Marcel Marceau very well known. Mime has been referred to as the “art of silence” by Marceau, who has performed professionally for over 60 years.
A Jewish family welcomed Marcel Marceau into the world in Strasbourg, France. Charles Mangel, his father, was a Bdzin, Poland-born kosher butcher. His mother, Anne Werzberg, was from the Ukrainian city of Yabluniv. He was actually a cousin of the Israeli singer Yardena Arazi through his mother’s family.
Marcel Marceau was a young Jewish guy who spent the majority of World War Two in hiding and worked with the French Resistance. Once Paris was liberated in August, he gave his first significant performance to 3,000 troops. He studied theatrical art and mime after the war.
Why Did Marcel Marceau Change His Name?
During the Nazi occupation of France, Marcel and his older brother, Alain, took the last name “Marceau,” which was chosen as a tribute to François Séverin Marceau-Desgraviers, a general of the French Revolution. The two brothers enlisted in Limoges’ French Resistance.
