Redouane Bougheraba, the first comedian to perform at the Vélodrome stadium in Marseille, this Saturday June 22, is a master in the art of winnowing the spectators in the front row… who are asking for more.
“I hadn’t seen your skull, brother… It’s a planet, I want to put on ‘National Geographic’. You have a head, it looks like a big toe. To put on a cap, he needs ‘a shoehorn’. No pity for the first row. Fans of comedian Redouane Bougheraba know that spectators sitting in front are expensive. And they love it.
“There are people who paid 500, 1,000 euros per seat, to be in the front row, to taste,” he explained in the show What an era!on January 27.
While the place costs “50, 60 euros”, some are ready to pay ten times more. “Afterwards, there are people who put (extravagant) prices. 8,000 euros on Leboncoin, I don’t think it started at that price, but 500, 1,000 euros, yes,” he added, evoking a real “black market”, for these places.
This Saturday evening, Redouane Bougheraba will face a particularly busy front row, at the Orange Vélodrome stadium in Marseille.
“The largest front row in the world”
“There will be four front rows, 200 people in total. It will be the largest front row in the world, and it will be exceptional,” he detailed to BFM Marseille.
In less than a decade, the Marseille comedian who worked at the Jamel Comedy Club has established himself in the world of stand-up. Developing his trademark over the course of increasingly larger venues: jokes on the spectators. Redouane Bougheraba has become the master of “roast”, this subgenre of stand-up which consists of making fun, often with a certain malice, of members of the audience.
The one who drew caricatures of his teachers and other students in class and made his classmates laugh, swapped drawings for words. Profession, appearance, outfit, first name, origin, everything goes. The regular shelling of spectators in the front row is an integral part of his shows.
“My specialty is improvisations, it’s the front row, making jokes, interacting with the public,” he told Le Parisien, on the sidelines of a press conference at the Accor Arena from Bercy in November 2023.
“It’s stronger than me, I don’t know what I’m going to say, but the front row inspires me. They are there, they are in front of me, they want to be part of the show. The front row is part of the show “, he added.
“It’s made with love”
And the front row asks for more, smiling under the flood of jokes, without ever getting offended and jostling to bear the brunt of the comedian’s jokes, the first to be surprised by such masochism.
“I thought that it would stop, that at one point they would understand that the first row tastes! But precisely, they want unlimited tasting,” he indicated to Le Parisien in November 2023.
Perhaps it is because “it is always done with love and kindness” and that Redouane Bougheraba does not spare himself, as he explained to 20 minutes last February. However, he assures not to insist if he senses reluctance, and to set limits depending on the country where he is “because we can laugh at everything but not with just anyone”.
“A valve taken out of its context can be atrocious. But in its context, in a theater, you can do anything in a theater,” he confided on France Inter a few months ago, also indicating to keep a distance from politics.
A family matter
Among the Bougheraba, the valve is a family affair. Since he was very young, this is where Redouane Bougheraba cultivated his sense of repartee. “He always had this chat. He was always very powerful”, underlined to BFMTV.com, his brother Ali Bougherabathe director of SEGPA last February.
“At home, we are five brothers and a sister. At family meals, we have to defend ourselves.”
Under the leadership of Ali, the older brother, who trained in stand-up and improvisation, four of the five Bougheraba brothers now work in entertainment or cinema. Ali and Hakim Bougheraba are directors. Ichem is an actor. As for Nabil, the fifth brother, he works in politics, which also requires a certain oratorical talent.
Redouane Bougheraba refined his chat through contact with the young people he worked with as an instructor. “Redouane was a great clasher. He was a monitor at the Contact Club in Marseille (an association which supports young people and families from the central districts of Marseille, Editor’s note). When you deal with young people, you have to have repartee . You have to be fluid. Otherwise, the little ones won’t miss you.”
Finally, the comedian, who has lived in London since 2012, trained in stand-up in New York. He was inspired by Anglo-Saxon stand-ups like Andrew Schulz. Across the Atlantic, “roast” has been practiced since the 1950s. And before filling Bercy or the velodrome, he practiced the art of improvisation with the public in small venues, chaining scenes relentlessly .
In 2020, capturing the interest of social networks, he began to publish extracts from his shows, essentially jokes with the public. On Instagram, his 1.4 million subscribers and on TikTok his 1.7 million subscribers delight in his exchanges with Alessandro, Omar, Nadia and the others. Dozens and dozens of sketches with the first rank. This Saturday at the Vélodrome stadium, there will be almost as many to “enjoy” with a smile.
