“The foreign guy performs humorously,” uttered the audience after seeing Guillaume Faugère in the play, Tinh duyen thuo truoc (Ties of Love Before), at the Hoang Thai Thanh Stage in Ho Chi Minh City during Tet holiday three months ago.

Guillaume Faugère on the wedding day with a Vietnamese girl - Photo: SGTT

Guillaume Faugère

The French man has recently been known as a drama actor in HCMC. Although he doesn’t speak Vietnamese very well, his charming play-acting and dialogue always bring a smile to the audience.

Many said that his on-stage charm comes from his love for the art.

He told QDND, a local newspaper, that he preferred to confront challenges in a far away place like Vietnam, which had been known to him as a place of war, and through renowned director Tran Anh Hung.

Although he just played a supporting role in Ties of love Before, he still maintained an attitude of seriousness.

He said he was experienced with plays in France before but when he set foot on a Vietnamese stage, he had to cope with a lot pressure in his mind such as what would happen if he forgets dialogue or acts like a fool on stage or how to pronounce Vietnamese so that everyone could understand.

When asked what his impression of the city was, the French actor’s answers were very different from other foreigners who often said they were impressed by local cuisine or tourist destinations with beautiful beaches and natural forests.

Unlike them, Guillaume confided he was inspired by the country’s traditional art cai luong (reformed theatre) when he first heard it on radio.

“It sounds different from that of the West but is full of human soul,” he told local media.

Having graduated from cinematography faculty at a University in Paris and born in Bergerac, a small city in southwestern France, Guillaume Faugère has been living in Ho Chi Minh City for four years where he works as a lecturer on film-shooting and screenplay at Arena Multimedia School, and is a teacher of cinematography in a Francophone Primary School.

In spite of foreign nationality, his experience of the city is wide-reaching. Everything in the city appears to be familiar with him so that he even considers it his second home. He shows a deep love for rows of ancient houses surrounding Cho Lon (China Town) and tall trees located on the city’s centuries-old roads.

He is married to a Vietnamese girl and now lives together in a rented house in Cho Lon. He drives motorbikes and hangs out with friends to enjoy side-walk eateries during free time like local people.

Guillaume has tried to fit into the local life in a country he loves and regards as an interesting place to dedicate to art.