During a performance, a claque is a group of people who are paid to applaud. Claques are no longer widely used in modern theaters, concert halls, and opera houses, but they were once quite common, particularly in the nineteenth century. A large group of admirers who follow politicians and other major public figures is also referred to as a “crowd.”
A claque is an ancient concept. Soldiers were used Roman emperors to swell crowds for speeches, with the soldiers being told to cheer loudly when the emperor appeared. Claques also guided audiences in Greek plays, and they were never truly absent from performance halls, but the claque was refined to an art form in the nineteenth century, with members of the claque guiding the audience, showing them when to laugh, applaud, or cry.
The term “claque” means “handclap” in French, indicating the highly evolved 19th century claque’s French origins, which were led a chef de claque who would have been intimately familiar with the work. Many claques took pride in their in-depth knowledge of the pieces they were hired to promote. The claque’s members would be seamlessly integrated into the audience, ensuring an even distribution to reduce suspicion.
Pleureurs would cry, while Rieurs would laugh at appropriate moments in the performance; many of the pleureurs would be women, who might find themselves without handkerchiefs and needing assistance from an unwitting bystander. At the end of a performance, bisseurs would request an encore, while commissaires were hired to point out particularly interesting or notable points in the piece to the audience. The members of the claque would work together to ensure a positive audience response to a performance.
Claques began to lose favor toward the end of the nineteenth century, as a new trend of respectful, quiet audiences emerged. Applause in the middle of a performance, as well as exaggerated reactions to events in the performance, are frowned upon in today’s performances. However, it is not uncommon for theatres to fill seats in non-sold-out performances with friends of the theatre, who may act as a more subdued version of the classical claque.