"Non, je ne regrette rien" Piaf and her music

"Chanter est un moyen de sortir. C'est un autre monde", said Edith Piaf, the celebrated French singer, who inspired the world with her voice. Piaf, an adaptation of Pam Gems' play, was presented in Teatro de La Alianza Francesa de Lima, staging the story of the famous singer, and her life full of addictions, love affairs, and most importantly, music. Singing was always present during the entire play, to portray and support the story and what the characters felt, and further evoke the memory of Piaf and her songs.

To begin with, the characterization of Piaf brought to life the singer, and through the use of the voice, the character presented the most important aspect of Piaf's life. The actress majorly focused on the use of the voice, imitating a french accent yet maintaining the street like tone, to set the audience in France but also present the fact that Piaf began as a street beggar. However, there was a major contrast in her rough accent, with her voice in the songs; she maintained very high notes and used a more clean yet distinctive french accent. This idea evoked the memory of Piaf herself, who was recognized for her distinctive voice and accent, which the actress tried to copy. Also, the cleaner side of the voice in the song also gave the effect of Piaf being her real self, instead of the street beggar she was. As the play continues, her accent stays the same, but the street like tone begins to slowly disappear, into a more classier and sick one, to portray her addiction and her sickness. It is also noticeable that Piaf was a very rude character, in the sense that she was always swearing and had a very grotesque vocabulary, which created the effect of her street life, of her not being civilized or educated enough to behave and have a proper vocabulary. Similarly to her voice, she progressively fixes her language and has a different register, to emphasize her progression as an artist and woman, but still keeping her use of swearing, to create the effect of a connection with her past, of being true to oneself and not changing. In contrast, the lyrics of her songs are quite poetical, in fact beautiful, when singing about love, youth, loss, among other themes, which evokes the effect of how music liberates her from everything that ties her, just as she said in her quote; it is another world on its own. Regarding other characters, they all maintained a standard french accent to evoke the setting of the story, and was cleaner and more sophisticated depending on the character's social status, to mark the difference. The other characters had a more standard french accent, which differed from Piaf's, creating the effect of Piaf's different voice, and emphasizing her distinction from other Frenchmen and even singers.
One of the most important acting elements in the play was the energy and the stage presence the characters maintained. The play itself was pretty dynamic, with a lot of different actions filling the scene, however the focus was always on Piaf, and thus she had a very driving and powerful energy. The audience obviously recognized her as the main character, however mostly in the first part of the play, she does not have a lot of stage presence, and maintains a very dull energy, to explore the side of the street and homeless Piaf.  However, when she sings, the actress achieves a major stage presence, and projects an amazing amount of energy, to evoke the effect of her expressing her feelings through the art of singing, and taking all the focus towards her, mirroring what was said of Piaf herself and her abilities as a singer. On the other hand, other characters maintained more stage presence, but lost it all completely, as if they weren't even on stage when Piaf sang, to evoke the power of her songs and reflect Piaf's idea of singing being another world, isolated. Still, some of the characters, such as Lepleé, who sang on their own, took focus from the scene and achieved full presence in the scene, similarly to Piaf, to give importance to what they were trying to say, which even though was in french, it was later supported by the dialogues explaining.
As for characterization itself, one of the most notable ideas regarding the songs was the contrast of Piaf's character and her persona when singing. Piaf was portrayed as a very grotesque character, being very vulgar and rude, as she did a lot of cruel jokes, swearing, and sexual implications. This characterization gave a new insight into the life of Piaf, and how her life was full of addictions. However this is image is built parallel to Piaf's persona when singing, which was kind-hearted, lovely, and beautiful, in contrast to the grotesque characterization. This creates the effect of Piaf's insecurities as a person, trying to be accepted in the world, a theme she explores at the first part of the play. Moreover, the audience is set to feel disgusted by her character, yet moved by her singing, creating the effect of how music breaks you out from reality.

The play was divided into two acts, presenting the audience with the story of Piaf's rise to fame in the first one, and her decay in the second one. During the first part, the audience gets to meet Piaf as a homeless survivor in France, and watches her go through the different steps and obstacles in the road to fame. In this act, the songs Piaf sings are a lot more joyful and about love and desire, specially when she sings about Marcel, and their relationship. It is interesting to notice that there are a lot of conflicts around her, such as Leplee's death, the world war, and the abandonment in her life, but still she continues to sing about the joys of life and love, creating the effect of her being persistent about her dreams and enduring the harships of life, and supporting the story of her fame. Most of the songs for this act are done for the sake of a presentation, to Leplee, to the club or even a stadium, with the exception of the songs to Marcel. The last song of the first act marks the definite change in Piaf's life, her turning point into decay, which was the death of Marcel. Piaf sings about his death and her grieve, and expresses her powerful emotions, breaking the goofy Piaf into a broken one, for which this is the turning point of the story, and the first climax. The second act, explores mostly her life as a stablished singer, and her attitude as a diva persuing to do as she pleased, and trying to find new talents, as well as someone to love given Marcel's death. In this act, her songs become more emotional, and more concentrated on her loss and her addictions, supporting the story of her decay and eventual death. It is interesting that during the first act, only Piaf sang, with the exception of Leplee's demonstration, whereas in the second act, three other characters have solos, for which they are the new talents Piaf discovered. This idea of more characters singing invokes a sense of weakness and decay of Piaf, due to her health and mental conditions, which did not let her sing as much as she did before, thus the use of other characters provides the audience with the idea that Piaf is looking for someone like her as she will not be able to continue for long.
One of the most interesting aspects of the structure, is the repetition of the first scene, in which Piaf is supposedly about to perform "Non, je ne regrette rien". The first time this scene is presented is at the begining of the play, when the presentor enters the stage and announces her, thus she comes in and begins to sing, but she fails, and is interrupted by the presentor, who she insults and the scene ends. Towards the end of the play, when Piaf is extremely sick and unable to work, she decides to sing to recover her fame. The scene is repeated just like the first time, but with the presence of his follower and mentee. When it finishes, it is repeated again, but now she interrupts herself due to pain, and the scene is repeated again two more times, until she falls unconcious to the floor due to the pain. The repetition of the scenes creates the effect of Piaf's failure, specially the first time when she fails but then the story tells how she conquers and stands up again. On the other hand, the other repetitions, the continuous ones, give a sense of defeat, as Piaf is trying to sing and pushing herself to do it, but failing at it, repeating as if the crowd would understand her condition. Therefore, the repetitions are progressive and further explore her defeat, and makes the audience feel worried and sorry for her. This moments are the only ones in which Piaf is unable to sing, regardless of any other factor, which emphasizes her struggle to keep fighting.
The play begins with her attempt to sing her most famous song "Non, je ne regrette rien", which contrasts with the ending of the play, in which, even though she had died, she sings the entire song and pours her heart out, even crying. This idea of ending with the succesful attempt to the song brings together the effect that Piaf's life was indeed an inspiration, and even though the path was rough, she achieved the fame and greatness she was destined to. The audience is set to be inspired by the song, and the final successful attempt. It is notable that the song itself says "i don't regret a thing, not a single one", which in retrospects the life of Piaf full of suffering and hard choices, in which she expresses " i don't regret it", creating the effect of the message of being proud of oneself. Also, the fact that the song, the attempt for Piaf to sing it, is successful after she dies evokes the sense that her music is still alive nowadays, and hence brings her memory to life.

In terms of design, the use of the lights was of major importance to the story, the portrayal of the characters and the delivering of the songs. Lighting was pretty simple on its own, and there weren't many changed patterns, by maintaining the standard amber lights with a medium intensity. It was interesting to notice that the entire scene was lit, however there was a main focus on only one element of the scenery, in which most actions happened. For example, when Piaf and Toinne chatted in their apartment, only the bed and the bedside table were focused. This design helped to give focus to the most important aspects of the scene, yet keeping the other parts lit to be seen. During the songs, especially the major solo's in which Piaf expressed her feelings, the light of the entire scene was shut, and only the singer was focused, in order to bring the character to major importance, and to concentrate on their singing. The focusing helped not only to illuminate, but also to help express the effect as if the character was thinking and feeling through singing, and the isolation from the world into another one.
Music was present live in the play, with the help of several musicians who where on the back of the stage. The main instruments used were an accordion, a piano, and a cello, which are traditional french instruments, further evoking the setting of the play and helping to create the atmosphere of it. The presence of live music helped to evoke the effect of a more pure music, instead of using pre-existing recordings that would not sound as good, and would take away the power of Piaf's singing. Being live gave more power to Piaf's songs as they sounded more personal, as if her emotions were creating the melody and she was singing on top of it, supporting her ideal of music being another world. It was interesting that in several songs that Piaf sang, there was no music played whatsoever, which seeks to emphasize more on the words and what she was trying to express, creating the effect as if she was talking and expressing her discomfort as a monologue, but singing it to escape from the tragedies.

There are several connections between our play and Piaf. For starters, the use of the live music and the traditional melodies is quite similar in both plays, as they imitate the French style, and we imitate the India one. Also, the use of the lighting to focus the main parts of the scenes, specially when singing, is similar to our focus on the royal dancers during the prologue and the ending to emphasize their narration, and take focus off the other elements on stage. Likewise, the idea of repeating part of the beginning in the end is also present in both plays, as we intend to repeat the first part of the prologue to bring together the timing of the play.

In conclusion, we can see that the play used singing and songs to portray the story and evoke the character's feelings and ideals, supported by the acting, design and structure of the play. Edith Piaf was greatly celebrated by her talent and amazing music, but she is also recognized by her tragic life full of suffering. Thus, the play intends to tell the story of her life, giving all aspects of it, and uses her most notable characteristic, her singing, to support their message, and thus bring her to life, bring her memory along with the play. The use of the singing succesfully brings the entire play to achieve its goal of bringing the memory of Piaf to live, because she is a singer, and what best way to do it by singing. Piaf used to say "death is the beginning of something", and in her case was her legacy as the French legend, which the actors intend to homage in the play.

"Je tiens à faire pleurer les gens, même quand ils ne comprennent pas mes mots"- Edith Piaf