SLAPSTICK FUN AT NICE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17526, 1 May 1925, Page 6

SLAPSTICK FUN AT NICE.

CARNIVAL JOY. LIFE IN CARICATURE. NICE, February 24. Carnival came to Nice at last, after four days of postponement, during which rain, hail, storm and gale reminded us that more than ten weeks of uninterrupted sunshine was too much to expect. Now. sunshine and warmth are back, and King Carnival XVII. —an obese monarch in the wig and satin costume of the Louis XV. period, loft tall by 4ft fat. who sat astride his chariot instead of being inside it—has made a grand entry into his capital. His is a queer cavalcade, and many scores of thousands of Nicois and visitors welcome it with laughter and confetti as it jigs round the square on a golden afternoon or a bright evening. GROTESQUES. Grotesquely enormous pigs ride on and feminine fantastics sprawling barrels and beer vats, with harlequins on their backs. Bulls and bullocks in top hats, striped trousers and fancy waistcoats, three times the size of a man, strut by the side of all-white chefs just as gargantuan. I Nightmare drunkards, terrible carrots, pink-nosed butterflies that cast \ nets over bare-headed girls in the crowd, mad lobsters, weird old men*of the sea and the woods —these and many other giants share the processions with the more orthodox ladies and gentlemen of Louis the VP*cII-be-loved's court. And on every passing chariot there arc orchestras of banjo, mandolin and drum, and agile couples that dance with incredible vivacity and just a little immodesty. Delegates from several seaside rei sorts in England—Blackpool and More- | cambe among them —have come to 1 Nice in search of ideas for summer carj nivals at home. They will note, if they have discern- | ment. that the processional “ features ”

tators are slapstick ones which caricature something out of everyday life that everybody recognises. * COMIC COOK. Thus, the cook in the comic kitchen, whose casserole has been broken, the corpulent bather who has slipped from a papier-mache rock; the huge grotesque masks that reflect as in a distorting mirror, well-known types on a sea promenade; the family disputes with saucepan and frying pan; the maids-of-all-work with brdoms for bodies, brushes for arms, scrubbing brushes for sandals and shovels for ornaments. Meanwhile the revels at Nice are gathering in intensity and permissible folly. There are Louis XV. balls at the opera, to which go all the appurtenances of old-time Versailles except the Sedan chairs; open-air balls in the big square, in which qhaperones have no place; battles of flowers; and clay after sunny day. during ■which youth never wears anything but Pierrot dress and the soap-bubble spirit of freedom, from reality. INVENTOR OF THE “ BOB.” Among the transient in Nice is a quiet little man who sometimes, from a chair on the Promenade des Anglais, looks at the curling waves and imagines them to be so many coiffures that badly need attention. He is M. Labarbe, the Parisian barber who invented the “bov-shingle” method of dressing the modern girl’s hair—the sleek straight-back style that Paris still calls la garconne, and that Miss Mollic Kerr has adopted in “ The Vortex.” M. Labarbe lives in a suburb of Paris, but when at home his clients’ limousines bring him every afternoon to the big faubourgs, where he trims and dresses pre-dinner hair at 100 francs a boudoir visit, lie is here on holiday, but he still condescends to be fetched by car in the afternoon when the Cpmtesse de Tel or Madame dc Tel Autre has to attend a function in Cannes or Monte Carlo.