Comedian Patrick Vesselier says he decided to do a show in Chinese.Li Xiang/China Daily

"If Adam and Eve had been Chinese, they would probably have eaten the snake instead of the apple," says the French comedian Patrick Vesselier, who, despite never having been to China and not being able to speak a word of the language, is performing a stand-up show in Chinese.

Learning the local nuances

Formula for success

"I had a bet with my friend that I could do such a show," Vesselier says.

It was not until he started to write his script and have it translated into Chinese that Vesselier began to realize how difficult and demanding the job was.

It took him three months to finish the draft of the story. He then found a Chinese freelance interpreter named Jia Chunjuan who helped him translate, polish and adapt the French script into a show that would please Chinese audiences.

The routine is about a Frenchman in his 40s who sees himself as a loser with no money, no job and no woman. He believes his life would be better if he were Chinese.

While many of his friends and colleagues had considered it a mission impossible, Vesselier managed to make jokes and play with the words in Chinese for an hour, producing paroxysms of laughter from both the Chinese and French members of the audience.

"I told my Chinese friend that in France we have the freedom to criticize President Hollande. My Chinese friend replied: 'Great. In China, we can criticize Hollande, too'," he joked onstage.