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A profound experience for Daniel Lavoie

Le Journal de Montréal, 3rd May 2003
By Paul Villeneuve

After having been directed by Claude Fournier on the set of the film The Book of Eve, Daniel Lavoie told the director that he would never agree again to appear with no clothes on in a film.

"I'm awfully shy and self-conscious, even if there's nothing explicit in the film, for me it was, err, explicit." Daniel Lavoie confessed amusingly. The singer and actor will surely do OK when he meets Claude Fournier on set again for the long length TV film about Félix Leclerc, in which he takes the title role. In The Book of Eve, for which Claude Fournier and Terri Hawkes wrote the script from the book by Canadian novelist Constance Beresford-Howe, Daniel Lavoie shares star billing with Claire Bloom who is well known for her acting in Limelight (1952) alongside Charlie Chaplin.

"We were both terribly embarrassed, though Claire Bloom is much more the professional than I am … We turned up each day because we had to. We laughed about it." Lavoie continued. The last scenes in the film were shot in January 2002, a year before our meeting with Daniel Lavoie, on an evening when there was no performance of the musical Le Petit Prince.

With Claire Bloom

When Daniel Lavoie is asked how he got to act in a film in his first big part, he replied that quite simply, Claude Fournier offered him the part of Johnny the Rumanian immigrant who finds himself falling in love with Eva (Claire Bloom). "I said … oh yeah, that should be fun. A month before filming was due to start, I called Claude to tell him that I didn't think I was up to playing the part. He came over to my place in a flash and succeeded in persuading me to do it", he declared.

Daniel Lavoie points out that he was intimidated by the part because firstly, he had to play someone with a Rumanian accent (the film was made in English) and secondly, because he had to act with a truly great actress, Claire Bloom.

"Every day Claire gave me a lot of encouragement. I told myself that I couldn't be that bad because Claire turned up smiling on set each morning. So I weathered the storm and, in the end, it went rather well", he underlined.

Daniel Lavoie and Claire Bloom met up for the first time one month before filming began, to read through the script together. "I didn't know who she was and she didn't know who I was. We had to see if we could play these rather odd lovers. I discovered that she had a wonderful sense of humour and that we could probably get on well together."

He wants to do more.

For Daniel Lavoie, who had followed his own line of work for 35 years, it was the first time that he had found himself in an area of work where he was not in control of the situation. Daniel Lavoie employed the services of a Rumanian who had lived in Québec for eight years, so that he could get used to the Rumanian accent. He made him read out aloud to him all the dialogues in a loud voice.

"And, bit by bit, I took on his ways and I changed a few of them to be more peculiar to me and to make it easier for me to do. So, in my interpretation, there was a similarity with a Rumanian accent." He pointed out.

Before making the film The Book of Eve, Daniel Lavoie was not keen on films as a mode of expression.

"I hadn't wanted to do it but, when filming ended, I realised that I had liked it. It was a very profound experience. I found the concentration exercise in making a film to be very interesting. I'd never had the opportunity to play someone who was totally unlike me. I'd acted in Le Fabuleux Voyage de L'Ange (1991) by Jean-Pierre Lefebvre but the character I played was a bit like me. So I didn't have to change much and I've truly never had the opportunity to act in anything else. This time it was all very different and great fun. I even want to do more," he made clear.

And it's good what he's about to do.

"I'm not going to try to imitate Félix Leclerc. It's more as if Félix is like me and singing with my voice" Daniel Lavoie concluded.