All that humor can do for humans Nicole Ferroni and therapist Catherine Dolto share their thoughts

The beautiful bow tie of the Raymond Devos Prize was presented Tuesday evening to comedian Nicole Ferroni by Catherine Dolto, president of the Raymond Devos Foundation, accompanied by Michel Boujenah, artistic director of the Ramatuelle Festival. On this occasion, we met these two talented women, one a comedian, the other a doctor. They shared with us their thoughts on the beauty of humor, the meaning of its practice on a family or social scale, and its irreducible power.

Catherine Dolto, the importance of humor for humans

Although she is a haptotherapist - a therapeutic approach to the person developed by Frans Veldman - Catherine Dolto, daughter of psychoanalyst Françoise Dolto and physiotherapist Boris Dolto, is far from being a stranger to the stage, which she shared during 16 years of collaboration with the august Meriem Menant (Emma the Clown). Together, they have designed several comic conferences combining the transmission of knowledge and humor, aimed at adults.

During her career as a doctor, Catherine Dolto, however, reflected a lot on the role of humor in raising children. "It's absolutely essential, first of all with toddlers, " she explains. "When you say things while laughing, singing, dancing, everything goes. Then, in learning about life, you mustn't forget that little ones are in a phase where they are still totally self-centered. Education is a long process of de-egocentration. When you're surrounded by adults who are capable of laughing at themselves and at life's little dramas, humor is like a loop that has made an extraordinary shortcut and which transmits a lot. You can always de-dramatize with humor and I believe that in education, de-dramatization helps a lot with de-egocentration. That doesn't mean that we don't value anything; it's more about showing in actions and words that there are many things that are not so serious. Conflicts between humans can and must be overcome!"

Sensitive to clowning, Catherine Dolto finds this art of humor "formidable, because it's like a huge magnifying glass on the essential, in the human being. That's why it's so difficult, she notes, much more than performing a text. The clown is at the deepest level of himself. There is nothing more delicate, because there is both an enormous exhibition of his intimate being and at the same time a very great modesty."

Among the masters of humor that Catherine Dolto admires is, of course, Raymond Devos, whom she knew personally before working to pass on his artistic legacy as president of the Raymond Devos Foundation. "For me, he's a beacon of light. There are people like that who light the way for other humans and give us courage."

A necessary courage, since for the therapist, "the big message of humor is that we are mammals afflicted with a big brain, the only one that is aware of death, without knowing when and how it will happen. It is unbearable, in a way, and humor has this extraordinary power: even in a tragic situation, it opens up a space."

Nicole Ferroni, a political and informative laugh

After several years working for the National Education system as a biology teacher, Nicole Ferroni found her audience through television in 2011. Starting out as a general practitioner, she gradually developed political sketches, culminating in her current "therapy" format, in which she pretends to receive politicians during hilarious consultations, thereby subverting the image of a psychotherapist. "When I have a bit of insomnia, I watch the debates in the National Assembly, " she says. " I really advise the French to go see what's going on there. I, who have a slight tendency toward anti-political anger, find it really interesting to see how the debates unfold, what the democratic machine is for, and how it works." If her political awareness came from the teaching environment, where she noticed a difference "between what is voted on at the national level and what people experience on the ground afterwards" , it also comes from having been in front of political guests, when she was a columnist on France Inter. A career stage that she uses in her comedy: "I really like playing at receiving the President of the Republic in therapy, she says. The fact of having this gap allows me to say things that are still very direct, to decipher, and even to give information, sometimes. Humor allows you not to just preach to the converted. Laughter has a very unifying effect, because it feels good to laugh! When you laugh at things you don't agree with, you still have a good time and the message is understood. "