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| To Paris, to escape le Brexit … where Hollande has never looked more lost | To Paris, to escape le Brexit … where Hollande has never looked more lost |
| (about 2 hours later) | |
| To Paris, to escape le Brexit. Except here there’s a proper state of emergency, rather than a self-imposed one. Temperatures are hitting 35C and Paris Plage, the annual pop-up beach by the Seine, opened on Monday. But now there’s also a new, not entirely welcome street accessory for summer in the wake of the Nice attack: heavily armed police in fatigues on every corner. | To Paris, to escape le Brexit. Except here there’s a proper state of emergency, rather than a self-imposed one. Temperatures are hitting 35C and Paris Plage, the annual pop-up beach by the Seine, opened on Monday. But now there’s also a new, not entirely welcome street accessory for summer in the wake of the Nice attack: heavily armed police in fatigues on every corner. |
| Related: French PM booed at ceremony for Nice truck attack victims | Related: French PM booed at ceremony for Nice truck attack victims |
| Is this reassuring or alarming? Parisians aren’t sure. It’s a very different feel to November, when everyone was shell-shocked after Bataclan and many large department stores were operating with only one entry point open at a time. Back then I was respectfully frisked by a security guard in a branch of Zara who sighed at me mournfully: “Madame, I am so sorry to do this. It is shaming for us all.” Everyone seemed to submit in a spirit of solidarity. Now it feels as if the mood has changed to angry resignation. | Is this reassuring or alarming? Parisians aren’t sure. It’s a very different feel to November, when everyone was shell-shocked after Bataclan and many large department stores were operating with only one entry point open at a time. Back then I was respectfully frisked by a security guard in a branch of Zara who sighed at me mournfully: “Madame, I am so sorry to do this. It is shaming for us all.” Everyone seemed to submit in a spirit of solidarity. Now it feels as if the mood has changed to angry resignation. |
| The authorities have to be allowed to do whatever they can to make cities safe, but what, really, can be done? Down the street from where we’re staying, three young men with Kalashnikovs maintained a solemn vigil outside La Brioche Dorée, looking slightly embarrassed, as if they were wondering what on earth they were supposed to be looking out for. | The authorities have to be allowed to do whatever they can to make cities safe, but what, really, can be done? Down the street from where we’re staying, three young men with Kalashnikovs maintained a solemn vigil outside La Brioche Dorée, looking slightly embarrassed, as if they were wondering what on earth they were supposed to be looking out for. |
| Meanwhile the national debate centres on two opposing theories. Theory one is what the French newspaper Libération calls the “cry wolf” theory: loners and weirdos latching on to Islamist ideology and using it as an excuse to do desperate things that have nothing to do with religious fanaticism but are almost impossible to explain or rationalise. (See also: the Orlando nightclub shooting.) Theory two is that terrorist groups are becoming more adept at radicalising marginal people. Neither is particularly helpful in the hunt for a long-term solution, or when you’re trying to figure out how many police to deploy in the streets. François Hollande never looked more lost. | |
| Standout standups | Standout standups |
| We all need a laugh at the moment. So it’s pleasing to see the French looking for light relief. There are posters everywhere across Paris for Christelle Chollet, an Ellen-type actor/comedian who has brought the phrase le one-woman show to France. Her face is all over the Métro advertising her new show, Comic-Hall. | |
| Chollet’s style is very much what the French call comédie: a blend of slapstick, cabaret and musical comedy. She says she wants people to “feel like they’ve been to see Edith Piaf” – although she also performs take-offs of Batman, Captain America and Madonna. | |
| There are suddenly loads of women brightening up the French comedy scene. Nadia Roz, a twinkly-eyed French-Moroccan standup, and the French-Belgian Laura Laune (show title: Le Diable Est Une Gentille Petite Fille – The Devil is a Nice Little Girl) are both booking into the autumn at the Apollo Theatre in the 10th arrondissement. And over at the cult standup venue Le Paname Art Café, there’s even a bill with 10 women, Plus Drôles Les Filles (Girls Are Funnier). Not sure they are funnier (that’s just reverse sexism to me), but bravo pour l’effort. | |
| Free, to good home | Free, to good home |
| My favourite post-Brexit survivalist idea comes from a Parisian improv show. During Adopte-Un-Comique, at Le Point Virgule, standups have to compete for audience votes to be “adopted”. You have one sketch to win them over. It hasn’t quite got to the point where audience members literally have to take a comedian home. But maybe if the state of emergency gets any worse, adopting a standup for domestic consumption is not a bad idea. | |
| • Viv Groskop’s Edinburgh show, Be More Margo, is at The Stand from 4 to 28 August: www.edfringe.com |