In September 1988, Michel-Marc Bouchard wrote the following about his play:

Why should I talk about Bouchard's Orphan Muses? Well, because here is another play which I did not have the pleasure to see live on the stage as well as another character played by Roy which I'll never have the pleasure to savour.

But life is like that and sometimes cruel, specially if you missed such an event like the creation of Orphan Muses. A theatrical event does not leave much tangible souvenirs. If you want to recreate it and even partially, you must dig and dig again to come up with genuine witnesses. So when I have decided to write about it I did not have a ton of information ahead of me. To imagine Roy playing Luc I only had two supports : Three Montreal newspaper articles from September 1988 and the script of Michel-Marc Bouchard’s play, published
by Lemeac. That was all ! Those newspaper articles gave me enough meat to imagine the sets, the action and the direction received by the actors.

I fell in love with Luc’ s character immediately. This brother writer hooked up on the magnified image of his mother, this fragile but courageous brother always ready to defend her, really he had everything to conquer me ! He carries with him all the dreams and the souvenirs of these wounded children, abandoned by their mother who fled to Spain with her lover.

Luc, wearing one of his mother Spanish skirt is writing a book. He is revealing a mysterious correspondence that he had dreamed of : "Letters from the Queen of Spain to her son" where Luc makes his mother say all the beautiful words that he would had like to hear from her.

Isabelle made Luc come back to the village to the great dissatisfaction of Catherine. He and his younger sister are tenderly accomplices, and they both are facing an older sister who is cold, obsessed by money and the town’s gossips.
Isabelle loves Luc because he is unpredictable, says she :" I was longing for him, it is so nice when he takes a fit, it’s always «inusitado !»".

Time had stopped when their mother left them. That is why the play’s strong moments are the ones where the children bring back to life all their memories. And it is Luc who will make these intense moments relived. Dressed as his mother, he will be inhabited by her and therefore will give us
the entire story of this family drama which will unfold in his book. He will give life to his cherished mother for whom he has been longing for so long. That is why he will have difficulty to understand his sisters reactions : Catherine saying that she has no time to bother with this and Martine admitting that she has already forgotten the whole thing. To that Luc will
reply : " Are you trying to tell me that for the last twenty years you’ve never had any thought of what was happening to your mother ? How can you look at yourself in a mirror and not see her ?".

Leaving his sisters, he will go to the village to settle some other unfinished business. The village people who had dragged his mother through the mud, making her life impossible which finally forced her to leave town abandoning her four children.

However the people gave him a good beating and he was rescued by his sister Catherine who brought him back home. Putting on his men’s clothes,
which he rarely did according to Martine, Luc will assist to his sister Isabelle presentation revealing her secret. He and Catherine will listen to her story
felling so sad and powerless. Only Martine will be strong enough to hear the truth and will go back at peace.

I stop here. I can’t give you the outcome of the play ; it would be like stealing its raison d’être. It must be read or seen on the stage but not told...

At that time, critics had good reviews. Robert Levesque of Le Devoir wrote :

"actors, specially Anne Caron(Catherine) and Roy Dupuis came out very strong" (Le Devoir, 9/13/88 Section 2, Page 9 )

The picture used to support the article was showing Isabelle and Catherine in the foreground while Luc
was standing behind them with an absent look. The photography, made from an old microfilm was there more to outline the text than to try to show a good
picture of the subject.

La Presse’s Jean Beaunoyer also praised Roy’s performance in the role of Luc :

He will also mention Andre Brassard excellent job as a Director, having the actors move around the stage in " two feet of garnottes" on the floor. In Quebecois, "garnottes" mean gravels and there was 50cm of dried peas on the stage floor ! He also adds :

" When Luc ( Roy Dupuis) dressed up in his mother’s clothes walks around the table, he can hardly move as if his legs had been chopped off. Is it a symbol of the swamp ? Of the toughness of life ? Who cares ? That’s what make Brassard interesting. "

Thanks to him because he brought up to my attention a very important detail regarding the
action of the play.

And to add up to my knowledge, I went to see Robert Favreau movie which is on screen in Montreal in October 2000. The role of Luc is played
by Stephane Demers. That was a great help for me to build up the character. To read a play and to see it performed are two different things. I was able to measure Luc’s distress, to feel his vulnerability and his inter-action with the family. It is a nice movie but quite different from the original play. The picture being stronger than the script. But Fanny Malette (Isabelle) as well as Marina Orsini’s performances are excellent and made to measure. And what about Céline Bonnier as Martine : another great performance. It is for sure the best character, stronger, the most lucid and well balanced.
Right away I was dreaming of seeing this feminine cast on the stage with Roy. Nothing in the world would have stopped me to see that performance !

All the critics have applauded the play in the Summer of 1988. Roy had done a tremendous job. Directed by Brassard, inspired by Bouchard’s script and flanked by three excellent actresses, Luc played by Roy must have been
a beautiful character.

To sum up my feelings after having read the play, seen the movie and realized why Michel-Marc Bouchard’s play is still being staged to day around the world and in many language, I must say that the
Orphan Muses have opened another window on our dramatic art. Another look at our human condition and our way of life as autonomous people.

This play holds for sure a clearer definition of our people. We are at the same time dreaming and also down to earth. We were born in a wild country, orphaned, a race of orphan muses. Throughout our dramatic art there is always the same pattern which shows our shortcomings, the unfinished business, the lack of achievement. People born with the head up in the clouds and his feet dragging a rich but hostile soil. People abandoned by their motherland on the shore of the St.Lawrence River, scrutinizing the horizon in the hope to see the flagship announcing the return of our ancestors from France. We grew up alone, trying to create here, on this portion of Continent, a place that would look like us, while we were surrounded by strangers. Today I believe that we have made it as our voice is heard throughout the world. Our French voice, tinted with an American accent. And together with our collective soul our voice in unison with the chant of the Earth becomes our national anthem. The anthem of orphan muses.