A Giant Awakes in Nantes
The latest performance by the French mechanical marionette street theater company Royale De Luxe – with some remarkable pictures of their latest creation.
Nantes, the home town of Jules Verne, is situated in western France. Here, near the river Loire a giant deep-sea diver sleeps gently, waiting for his task to begin. Sadness marks his face even as he sleeps. He has been searching the world over for his missing niece and although he may not know it, the end of his search is coming. The diver or scaphandrier as he is known in French will be paraded through the streets of this historic city at the beginning of the Estuary 2009 arts festival. The biannual festival gives the French mechanical marionette street theater company Royale de Luxe the opportunity to unveil their latest creation.
He wakes and his helmet is placed on his head by his human helpers. This would well be considered a little too high for many but the performers seem oblivious to the height. Royale de Luxe was founded in 1979 and is actually based in Nantes, making this a return to the city that bore the company. They have, however, performed all over the world, as far away as Chile and Australia. You may remember the Sultan’s Elephant strolling through the streets of London in 2006. An associate company, La Machine created last year’s spectacular ‘Princesse’ a massive visiting spider in Liverpool when in was European City of Culture. Here, however, a giant returns home.
He rises, perhaps in the hope that his long quest will soon be over. The Giant, now equipped in deep sea diving gear and his little niece, the Little Giantess have featured in the works of the theatre company before. However, they have been away for a while with some information about which the world had previously been unaware. As with any Royale de Luxe performance there is a long and some would said drawn out back story. In 1912 the Titanic went down to the bottom of the ocean. Unknown to us, however, was that in its hold a giantess was held captive, the mother of the Little Giantess.
From a distance he looks small, but only if he were an ordinary person paying a visit to a Lego theme park. As he steadies himself he can resume his long search. The enormous diver is the scouring the earth for the Little Giantesse. She was captured in Iceland which was at the time the home of the giants, each having his or her own particular task. The Little Giantess was to wake up the geysers of Iceland when a message needed to be sent. You may wonder what on earth geysers and messages have in common but little known to the outside world the geysers were used to transmit signals between the giants, much like the smoke signals of American natives.
The mechanics behind this piece of street art are staggering and more than a little scary. How much the gentlemen forty meters above the ground are being paid is unknown but whatever it is, it is not enough. But where does the deep-sea diver properly come in to the story? He is the brother of the giantess who drowned on the Titanic. Originally he had been busy doing his own job – sawing up icebergs – to realize that his sister and her daughter were missing. His statistics are something extraordinary as well. He stands at nine and a half meters and a width of almost three. Weighing in at two and a half tones it takes thirty operators to control his movements.
In his past he has travelled the seabed for years and eventually he found the wreck of the Titanic. He buried his sister near the sunken ship. While there he discovered a mysterious box full of mail from the Titanic. He now had two new goals in life – the task of finding his niece and to deliver the mail. Since then he has wandered the earth in search of the Little Giantess. Still wearing the diving outfit he used to search the bed of the ocean, this festival marks the end of his search.
The momentum of his stride is enough to pick up two grown men off their feet and dangle them through the air. As with all of the Royale de Luxe open air spectacles little was given away before the day of the event, in this case Friday 5 June. All anyone knew was that the giant would wake up at 1.30 in the afternoon on the Tblisi Deck of the town. He made his way, astonishing the crowds on the way with his sheer scale. He was forced to stop twice on his route, however, not far from the hospital. However, a huge crowd waited for him at the Place Gloriette and he did eventually make it.
Will he ever find his niece? Well, tomorrow is another day, after all. However, this spectacle represents altogether another wonderful performance by the massed ranks of Royale de Luxe and a wonderful start to the Estuary 2009 Festival in Nantes.
Postscript. The good people of Nantes and the world had to wait until the day after to see whether or not the giant was reunited with his niece. It seems, now that it has happened, only fair to share with you the end result of his epic search. The picture below speaks for itself.
The author would like to thank Flickr user misterstf for permission to use the wonderful photographs contained in this article.
L’auteur voudrait remercier misterstf sur Flickr pour la permission d’employer les photographies merveilleuses contenues en cet article.
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User Comments
Bill M. Tracer
On June 7, 2009 at 1:52 am
What can I say, but WOW what a big marionette.
chris73
On June 7, 2009 at 2:03 am
Nice this.
Deep Blue
On June 7, 2009 at 2:11 am
Nice giant.
Francois Hagnere
On June 7, 2009 at 2:13 am
I saw it, it is quite amazing, a wink to Jules Verne in his native town. Thanks for sharing my friend! Beautiful photos too.
Glynis Smy
On June 7, 2009 at 3:49 am
Wow incredible. Interesting article and good photo’s.
Patrick Bernauw
On June 7, 2009 at 6:51 am
This really is eh… great!
DA Cournean
On June 7, 2009 at 7:20 am
Wow! Amazing!
Joe Dorish
On June 7, 2009 at 7:42 am
Pretty cool.
C Jordan
On June 7, 2009 at 8:48 am
Well done RJ. A good follow up to your article on their Steampunkt spider in Liverpool.
Lauren Axelrod
On June 7, 2009 at 10:49 am
This is amazing. He looks like he’s going to come alive.
433
On June 7, 2009 at 11:30 am
No video?
r. chan weeve
On June 7, 2009 at 8:41 pm
you tube link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmXVL9wZVXw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHzf2cjOxKs
Juancav
On June 7, 2009 at 10:24 pm
Great article showing mass street theatre to people.
pataglop
On June 8, 2009 at 2:10 am
hey, how about the little giant this big guy was meeting?
it was such a great show. Poetic and surreal. Just awesome!
gfiB
On June 8, 2009 at 3:25 am
great! looking forwar to seeing them in Berlin in October (1.-4.10.)…
milad
On June 8, 2009 at 5:04 am
amazing. really enjoyed. i will translate it to persian with a source link to your blog.
Betty Carew
On June 8, 2009 at 7:03 am
Wow what a wonderful article , very interesting RJ
jahnsan carew pirach
On June 8, 2009 at 7:39 am
boy, i really wish they’d put some ads in there. can’t they at least get a sponsor?
james
On June 8, 2009 at 10:26 am
cool giant
Rick
On June 8, 2009 at 11:21 am
That’s the girl from the Sultan’s Elephant, isn’t it?
payge
On June 8, 2009 at 11:51 am
A wonderful article with great pictures.Bet it takes alot for his upkeep and hers now to.Now that would be something to see.
M Shatwan
On June 8, 2009 at 11:54 am
very good article!
Simon Belmont
On June 8, 2009 at 12:11 pm
wowow
Rana Sinha
On June 8, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Now, that is something. Thanks.
David De Jesus
On June 9, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Very informative article accompanied by great photos. Great write.
Please check out my poem \’Is The Giant Really Sleeping\’
http://www.bukisa.com/articles/94636_theres-an-elephant-standing-in-the-room-was-the-giant-really-sleeping
Thanks again!
lion2x
On June 9, 2009 at 1:46 pm
very good informative blog, i liked the pics you put.
joe joe
On June 9, 2009 at 3:10 pm
Looks slightly like David Bowie but just as creepy
maryloustein
On June 9, 2009 at 3:53 pm
Here is an example of the kind of writing and article that I would like to be able to create. This was interesting, colorful, current and masterful. May the author move on to ever more and better material. Thank you for a great read.
Enelle
On June 9, 2009 at 10:44 pm
Excellent article, and wonderful pictures. I thoroughly enjoyed it, thank you!
Clinton
On June 10, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I love it, since it seems to be every June, I am going to plan a visit one year!
Stickinthemud
On June 10, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Truly fascinating. I liked this piece. Thanks for sharing.
demonethes1
On June 10, 2009 at 6:24 pm
stanly cup 2009
ArcanoLT
On June 11, 2009 at 3:55 am
Nice
ahmadmn1
On June 12, 2009 at 10:03 am
nnnniiiiiccceeeeeeee
s hayes
On June 12, 2009 at 10:20 am
Unusual freaky and very cool x
Teresa M Sims
On June 12, 2009 at 12:38 pm
wow thats amazing i had to show all my family
Street Smart
On June 12, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Informative and fascinating article.
Уилхелм Сцхнотз
On June 13, 2009 at 12:50 am
nice one. I liked It
tastoon
On June 13, 2009 at 2:14 am
very nice!
MJ Taylor
On June 13, 2009 at 7:18 am
That’s definitely worth watching, a giant under water diver. Will it be travelling the world for others to see?
leylucs
On June 13, 2009 at 10:56 pm
wow a giant! nice article..
Nelson Doyle
On June 14, 2009 at 10:13 pm
Awesome visual presentation of an amazing work of creativity.
shadlock
On June 15, 2009 at 11:59 am
nice
Gershwin1995
On June 15, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Ohhh that was some awsome !!! I liked the part when the child was sitting in his laps !! =P =)
Earl Schmegley
On June 15, 2009 at 5:51 pm
That is about the coolest thing I have seen in a long time! Thanks for sharing and the photos are awesome. Seriously great article.
overwings
On June 16, 2009 at 11:23 am
Amazing story. People handling it look like Liliputians. I wish I could see it with my own eyes.
coffeeadict
On June 16, 2009 at 2:07 pm
I never knew about this spectaculum. It’s amazing. Where I live we have a street festival in August every year. The sculptures and trucks are hueg enough but never reached these dimensions. Wow!
Janet65
On June 16, 2009 at 3:01 pm
This is a great piece of work. The written article is well-written, and the photo’s are awesome. Good job, Janet
CHAN LEE PENG
On June 16, 2009 at 11:11 pm
This is really an eye-opener article. Great job, RJ! Give u “liked it”
dakis
On June 17, 2009 at 4:33 am
Very nice marionette!
http://hellas-fos.blogspot.com/
Bill Cobbs(Gorkys)
On June 17, 2009 at 6:58 am
Extraordinary! Jules Verne would have loved it! My best memories of years in France are of the people of and near Nantes who made me a Vice Mayor of Vigneux Les Bains for my relatively minor WWII participation in the liberation. France is liberty and love!
Johanan Rakkav
On June 17, 2009 at 10:20 am
Merci beaucoup (thank you)! I never cease to be amazed and delighted at human creativity applied to a good cause.
Jessyka
On June 17, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Amazing is the only word i can say right now!
Aleksandar Radojicic
On June 17, 2009 at 2:32 pm
This is awesome.Great photos and great article.Keep up the good work.
Daisy Peasblossom
On June 17, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Incredible bit of theatre!
andy
On June 17, 2009 at 8:11 pm
wowwww
Emily Ashley
On June 17, 2009 at 8:57 pm
That’s scary!….and cool!
jean-marie DREANO
On June 19, 2009 at 3:52 am
To bill Cobbs
I’m french and professor of history. I collect informations about the commune libre ( free communes) , in particulary this of Vigneux les Bains. Could you give me more informations : dates, circumstances, names of persons, activities. I have on postcard of this group of vigneux les bains.
Best regards
Jean-marie DREANO
nenen
On June 19, 2009 at 9:22 am
marvelous!!!!
poop
On June 19, 2009 at 10:03 pm
awsome
Cynthia Bartlett
On June 19, 2009 at 10:04 pm
a beautiful story, thank you for sharing it.
alfrhnsby
On June 19, 2009 at 11:49 pm
ooohhh good !
tom
On June 20, 2009 at 10:58 am
Beatiful story,so nice.
gringoperry
On June 26, 2009 at 8:42 pm
I really like this work. Someone had a vision and seen it through to its spectacular conclusion and thats something thats not easy to do. The fact that you have documented it here only gives momentum to the artists dream.
B Nelson
On July 1, 2009 at 5:07 pm
Clearly behind on reading Stumbles that were sent to me.. this was terrific.. good work as always RJ
Mark Gordon Brown
On July 1, 2009 at 5:11 pm
As always an entertaining read coupled with excellent photographs.
ichyru rouge
On July 4, 2009 at 12:31 pm
good writing!! awesome pics!!! you seem to travel alot,which helps alot.
cesar
On July 22, 2009 at 6:46 pm
que divertido lo de la historia
hiday
On July 23, 2009 at 12:15 am
es
hermosoO!
ver este tipode arteee
es genial no tengo paalabars no e visto la peli pero me gustaria verlaa
Gravy
On September 4, 2009 at 6:26 am
He looks like a giant Paul Weller!
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