WESTERN EUROPEAN STAGES. Volume 9, Number 3 Fall 1997 Editor Marvin Carlson Contributing Editors Harry Carlson Rosette Lamont Miriam D’Aponte Glenn Loney Marion P. Holt David Willinger Olivier Py Phoo:Heraut Center for Advanced Studies in Theatre Arts Managing Editors Editorial Assistant Edwin Wilson, Director Erin Hurley, Jonathan Warman Patricia Herrera CASTA Copyright 1997To The Reader Our readers have, we hope, come to rely on Western European Stages to provide them with up to date reports on significant theatre activity throughout this productive region, but the current season in New York demonstrates that the reports in this journal can also help readers to keep up with or ahead of important activity here as well. Among the most eagerly awaited new productions of the season is Ivo van Hove's production of O°Neill’s More Stately Mansions at the New York Theatre Workshop, one of the city's most innovative companies. For most New York audience ‘members Van Hove is a totally unknown name, but not for our readers, who were introduced in his important work in our Fall, 1996 report on current theatre in Amsterdam. At the Union Square anew piece, Three- for-All, is currently being offered by the Catalan ‘company Tricicle, again unfamiliar to New York but not to our readers, who received an extensive report on recent work by this group in our special issue on Spain (Winter, 1997). In February of 1998 New York's Atlantic Theatre Company is presenting the American premiere of Martin McDonagh’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane, but our readers will already have an advance report on the this major new Irish play in Diana Barth's article inthis issue. Finally, the Brooklyn Academy, ‘which often brings to New York productions that have previously appeared in Europe, wll be offering this fall Robert Lepage’s Elsinore, reported on in these pages in cour Spring, 1997 issue. Of course itis still the case that the great majority of the most interesting and innovative European productions, even those that tour widely within Europe, never are seen in this country, and so, although we are very pleased when we can provide this sort of advance information, the main responsibility of this journal remains the providing of an insight, by description and photographs, into the varied and stimulating theatrical fare that American spectators, unless they travel abroad, can unhappily not experience for themselves, In the current issue we bring reports from several major festivals, themselves presenting significant productions from many countries, interviews and reviews of major ‘new offerings. Our upcoming Winter issue will be, as usual, a special issue, this year devoted to theatre in Italy, and we particularly encourage submissions for that issue. Subscriptions and queries about possible contributions should be addressed to the Editor, Western European Stages, Theatre Program, Graduate Center, CUNY, 33 West 42nd Street, New York, NY, 10036,Table of Contents ‘Volume 9 Number 3 Avignon: The Russians are Coming .. Nathan the Wise: A Tranquil Force: Denis Marleau in Avignon . Didier Bezace and Pereira Prétend . Festival and Fringe in Edinburgh. . Two Festivals, Three Plays: Caryl Churchill in London and Edinburgh. Spring Stages in Stockholm: Two Strindberg Productions Persephone atthe Olympics: Robert Wilson in Munich Marhaler Meets Chekhov: Tiree Sisters, Voksbuhne Premiere Christoph Marthaler's Stunde Null oder Die Kunst des Servierens. Interviow with Frank Castor (Opera and Theatre in Berlin. [A Dissenters View of The New Globe Andalusian Theatre Porgy and Bess on Lake Constance. ‘The Second Helsinki Act, May 1997 Visit to Galway ‘Two Plays in Dublin, Summer 1997 . Claude Régy Directs Maeterlinck’s La Mort de Tintagiles Macterlinck and Ibsen in Brussels, Making the Invisible Visible: Julien Roy on Staging Maeterlinck ‘Notes on Contributors Fall 1997 Jean Decock 5 Josette Féral 15 Benjamin Carey 21 Glenn Loney 27 [Rose Malague 37 Exther Szalezer 43 Christopher Balme 47 Lydia Stryk 51 Philippa Wehle Yvonne Shafer 55 Yvonne Shafer 59 Judith Milhous 65 Candyce Leonard 69 Glenn Loney 73, Philip Auslander 79 Diana Barth 83 George Bemstein 87 Suzanne Burgoyne 89 - Louis Muinzer 93 Suzanne Burgoyne and Carol McDaniel. 99 107Avignon: The Russians are Coming Jean Devock Avignon has recovered quite well from the ‘morning-after syndrome of the celebration of its SOth anniversary which took place last year. Shortened to three weeks, it remains the biggest theatrical event of the Summer in Europe and this 1997 vintage is by far one of the best of the decade, Even with its program tightened to thirty different offerings for 107,000 spectators (as against forty-five for 130,000 last year) Berard Faivre 'Arcier is proud that all venues were filled at 82% capacity. True, the main box-office attraction and crowd-pleaser was the retum of Bartabas/Zingaro wit his ewest show, Eclipse, which accounted for 42% ofall tickets sold during the whole festival, Nevertheless the main cultural coup was the coming ofthe Russians, a deliberate endeavor to open up to rarely seen theatre companies from Moscow. Let us put aside the ever increasing budget and political battles without minimizing the “economical horror” (the tile of Vivianne Forrester’ essay and the last trendy conversation piece about town this year) of “mondialisation,” with its frenetic pursuit of profit, the stark reality is that the future for companies looks bleaker than ever. On the one hand, the dominance of theatre as (Broadway) entertainment has extended from ‘Wester Europe to Poland and Russia. On the other some national companies drain the meager allotments of the Ministry of Culture or its equivalents at the expense of smaller and sometimes more daring groups who are not surviving the drought and are fast disappearing. A case in point is “L’inconvénient des ‘boutures," Olivier Py's company which has put itself in the red for the next two seasons just forthe privilege of performing three nights in the Cour des Papes. Haves and have-nots, aging tycoon directors and_ young iconoclasts also are batling it out. So in 1997, Faivre @’Arcier’s forty-one million FF (eight and a half nillion dollars) budget broke even. Did 1 read somewhere that the main theme for this festival was spirituality and mysticism? Give us a break! Whence the Russian theater today? With best regards from Boris Yeltsin, the whole contingent of 140 participants and technicians plus twenty VIPs of the theatre world, as well as sponsors (four banks plus Aeroflot who provided transportation), not to mention ministries, presidents ‘with interpreters and secretaries, all descended on Avignon, creating housing problems of major ‘magnitude. Some actors were even put two f0 a room, in close to dorm accommodations in the suburbs outside the walls of the city. A no doubt very expensive color brochure on glossy paper reminded us that theater in the USSR had always been a near substitute for religion. Bridging the gap between Stalinism and post-totalitarianism, the GITIS (Russian, Dramatic Art Academy) under Sergei Issaiev, we were told, is the biggest and oldest drama school by 120 years with some 1500 students and 300 master pedagogues and mentors. Judging by the amount of subservience atthe press conference, one could feel the terrorism of the veterans associated with an elitist screening process (atthe rate of 100 student auditions for one acceptance). Once accepted, the chosen enjoy ‘a communal togetherness and are put through a complete college education including physical training, after which they might hopefully join one of the repertory companies. Does this mean then that the old socialist system is endangered by the new rampant capitalist one, where actors no longer have the prestige ‘and security nor the salary and tenure they once enjoyed regardless of whether they were performing or ‘not? Which in turn make us realize that in France there is almost no repertory theatre left (except for the stale ‘Comédie Francaise) and that although there stil isthe Conservatoire and the Femis which replaced the IDHEC (Institut des Hautes Etudes Cinemato- graphiques), nowhere is stage directing taught. ‘The general and perhaps questionable policy applied by (or to) the Russian contingent was to offer 2 limited number of performances (three to four evenings) with minimal sets and small and sometimes ‘constricted venues. Only five hundred people attended three performances of Ostrovky and three hundred were able to see four of Tsvétaeva. | don’t know how the happy few fought their way in. Many did not succeed and got stranded and frustrated, Foremost was the presence ofthe Atelier Piotr Fomenko/ Workshop, disciples of the master who was detained in Moscow because of a heart condition,‘There were four examples of his and their work. Loups et brebis (Wolves and Sheep) directed by Fomenko himself is considered a landmark production of a nineteenth-century comedy of manners by Ostrovsky. Delicate and subtle, against all histrionics, it is an actor's showcase at its best, rather like chamber music, Performed in the open from 6:00 to 9:30, which made ‘adjunct electrical lighting useless, in a long and deep ‘courtyard with one tree and plants. In the St. Joseph College (a location selected by Fomenko himself) its staging was in an extended scope (letter-box) ratio, ‘with drab flea market furniture and macrame headrests, It was performed entirely in Russian without the help of subtitles or headsets but with occasional use of French expressions dans /e texte which made the audience purr with pleasure. Antoine's fourth-wall concept of intimacy and realism became a glass panel which prevented sound. Could one grasp what went on without understanding a word—perhaps a real test of what performing art drama should be? ‘What I saw was a leisurely comedy of distrust, seduction and conniving with an obvious insistence on letters, contracts and written documents some of them torn or bumed. The play seemed very much contemporary of Balzac with its pre-Marxist concer for money and class. But Fomenko doesn't want to side with wolves or sheep, both are human, Unforgettable was the prevalence of women's parts and the delicate grace of the three young actresses, two of ‘whom were the Kontepova twins—witty, piquante and yet sensitive and incredibly slender with byzantine fingers in contrast with the chubby, poohish young ‘males. Against tradition, all the older characters are played by a young cast without make-up. At the risk of sounding like a Russian boar myself I found the whole production exquisite and at the same time disappointing in terms of Fomenko’s reputation and the resulting expectations on the side of the public. Without a doubt the most exciting of all Russian presentations remains that of Ivan Popovski, the only young director and a disciple of Fomenko now on his own, He is in fact a Macedonian who leamed Russian in a matter of four years. His stunningly original and visual rendition of An Adventure (really ‘one of Casanova’s affairs) a short 75-minute playful playlet by Tsvétaéva (the unfortunate Russian poet who lived in Paris in isolation before she returned to the USSR and hanged herself after her husband and son ddied victims of the Gulag). She had nothing but ‘contempt for the theatre which for her was the earthly incamation of the ethereal mystery of being. In life hhowever, she disguised her contempt with her attraction fora young actress and on paper, with her dreamy post- symbolist, highly-colored evocation of a French aristocratic past and such womanizers as Lauzun and Casanova. Popovski’s revenge is to have ‘metamorphosized with the eye of a genius her not so brillant prismatic dream vignettes into a pulsating cinematic delight Staged initially in an actual corridor of the GITIS seen in length (here reconstructed for touring): comings and goings are fast paced, costumes and ‘manners ar all in perfect taste, never lewd and take on an accelerated Technicolor Tex Avery animation ‘quality, playing on the depth of field perspective with the door’s threshold as limelit proscenium. The width of vision is thus restricted to three or four viewers per row, about seventy five in all—reminiscent of Grotowski’s restricted audience of 99 plus Jerzy (asthe ever present director). A stunning experience for those fortunate enough to attend, Independent from GITIS, the nevertheless powerful and slightly frightening guru is Anatoli Vassiliev (who looks like a slender and younger Rasputin) and his School of Dramatic Ar. His theosophie philosophy of drama aims at reaching the spirit beyond psychology and even text (the Bible, Homer and even Moliére’s Amphytrion) which should be uttered rather than spoken, at once polyphonous and overlapping which was distressful to those who think it may be worth listening to. I attended his free ‘demonstration class on the /Mliad for ninety minutes. The five hundred spectators were discouraged from leaving the premises until the end, Vassiliev’s taining is serious business and what followed seemed more like a karate session in martial arts with a group of five men and three women clad in androgynous kimonos. At frst silent, the leader who has four years experience is joined little by litle by the others, building up to several small groups performing for each other and gradually becoming more aggressive with sticks then swords and other stage weapons. Just before the end there is a decompressing stage before the final salute. All of it conveys an Asian Zen totally asexual mood. ‘There is no music, only some subliminal breathing as the waves of a tide. Pure formalism, the signifier is there but what is the signified? ‘Chambre d’héte! dans la ville de N.N, the one hour adaptation of condensed elements of Gogol’s Dead Souls by Valeti Fokine was also totally un- traditional in that there is hardly any text (except for ‘two shor soliloquies)a far ery from The Revizor. The fifty or so viewers are introduced, guided and perched in their niches, benches and canopy balcony in what,tums out to be @ dingy, wooden, square, claustro- phobic hotel room, two sides of which are now totally wallpapered with silent eyes. In the center burs a single real candle to remind us of what it was like before electricity and it does take a while to adjust Tehitchikov's plan inthe city of Nidj)-N(ovgorod) is to buy dead souls or at least their names which he keeps in alittle cassette. From night to dawn and for what seems like three days we are drawn into his psyche: half asleep or drunk. We are privyy to his ‘washing, shaving and dressing, to the ritual of meals or samovar tea drinking, in a saucer of course. There are sounds of water, rain, laughter, cariage, bells but no music, He is visited by ral or sureal zombie visions ‘which emerge out ofthe cupboard, the wood work: the Governor's daughter in her wedding gown, peasants and matrons of both sexes, a couple of pilet children. In this brand of Russian black humor atmosphere bordering on the fantastic, the delight comes from the tention to minute details but the overall impression is ‘of grotesque ugliness with just a touch of poetry. The fourth and last offering came from St. Petersburg in quite another dimension: it was Georgian director Rezo Gabriadze’s puppet show The Song for The Volga or The Battle of Stalingrad, with recognizable music by Shostakovitch and original songs. Inthe small eastelet ofthe Chapel ofthe White Penitens, minute hand, wire and string puppets relate the mood of destruction and resurrection, From the white sand/snow, in elose up or panoramic immensity emerge posts, lags, crosses, isbas, canons and guns and cars, convoys, trains, bikes but also animals—birds, horses (mainly maimed or slaughtered) then people, Russians, Jews and Germans. There is an occasional flashback to Berlin in 1937 (Brecht, Lasker Schuler) or references to Grosz, Nolde and Chagall—an idyllic moment between lovers floating in the sky. The heart- rending contrast is between the epic (tanks like giant rollers) and daily life (two real hands washing dishes, the taking ofa tub bath). Itends with three inch ant crying, a symbol of survival ‘Summing up the Russian presence in Avignon is hard to do: obvious isthe search for solid universal nineteenth-eentury values. This is not the time for settling differences, exaulting ethnic identities, string up the recent (Stalinist) past. Sensuality, libido and sexuality ae restricted by romanticism or spirituality The flesh, not to mention nudity, is totally repressed Authors are classics (there was also Dostoyevski, Shakespeare and Tourgeniev) and star directors are older men and mature figures of authority who must have experienced a lot and whose weight may be overbearing. References to Stanislavski are fairly negative, those to Meyerhold and his biomechanical concept, minimal. The main revelation ofthis official display happens to also be the youngest, Ivan Popovsk, ‘with the twentieth-century writer, Tsvétaéva, perhaps because she was anachronistic with her dreamplays tuned towards the past. Strangely, its in the OFF festival that a more daring approach could be seen. La petite Lisa (Poor Lisa) is a refreshing musical very much inthe vein of The Fantasticks spoofing romantic melodrama. There is a similar vitality in this adaptation of the Nicolas Kazamzin maudlin 1873 classic novel by Mark Rosovski who also directed the small handsome cast of four served on your lap including the wrter/marrator himself on stage, and not forgetting @ quartet hiding in the aisles. A poor little peasant girl is seduced by a dashing aristocratic Lovelace, but of course first love when satisfied brings pregnancy and leads to abandonment. Eventually Lisa commits suicide in the lake and the remorseful hero confides his sad tale ten years later to the writer. All great fun and all in Russian and meet-me-halfway French. ‘Another very pleasant surprise was Mayakovsky's La Grande Lessive/The Grand Purge (1929 revisited, adapted and directed with great talent by South American director Marcos Malavia and his Sourou Company). A naive scientist has discovered a time machine which disolves its -metaphysical dimension into a pure sensory experience but itis then recuperated and exploited by the State nomenklatura, ‘A delightful clownish and futuristic romp (one may wonder if Mayakovsky saw Lang’s 1926 Metropolis), it was closer to Meyerhold than any of the official offerings. Sci-Fi was one ofthe ways by which writers could bypass Soviet censorship (witness Bulgakov’s ‘Adam and Eve). Here all ends well and the meanies are left behind—but in fact Meyerhold directed the original production before his deportation and death whereas Mayakovsky commited suicide in 1930, ‘Another Tsvétaéva surprise, Une Fortune, never published nor previously translated (here by Jeanne Boisaubert) was much more romantically conventional and more like a reading accompanied by Violin solo and the smell of roses recurring in the text. Lauzun, another notoriously ugly seducer becomes a tender manchild encouraged by three female figures. ‘The most devastating statement comes from the journalist writer Svetlana Alexigvitch’s Utopiés (Castaways from Utopia), an oratorio for three actors and three singers linked by the traumatic bereavment of misguided people who happened to believe in thesublime illusion of the Communist creed: a mother survivor of the Gulag harassed by her own daughter; a ‘young soldier caught in the deceptive Afghan war and the guilt of what men can do witha rifle in their hands; and finally, an older average idealist who believed in the Common Cause. A stem, dark, brooding, powerful production directed by Jean-Marie Lajude for the CChampagne/Ardennes’ L’Oeil du Tigre. I am sad to report that there seemed to be very little interaction between the Russian In and Off troupes. Like last year, three of the most intense moments of the Festival came from non-verbal productions, mixing dance, circus and theater. The ‘Yugoslav Angelin Preljocaj’s Ballet (which was at the Joyce in NY last Spring) triumphed in a powerful one- hour Paysage Aprés la Bataille (Landscape after the Battle): itis at times a violent and savage metaphor of ur time, His troupe of dancers—all beautiful, some ambiguous (one man wears a kilt miniskirt, some others long black gauze gowns)—in groups of two or three or clustered in heaps like dead bodies, prostrated, cataleptic, come back to life for another round at the sound of Anglo and Italian pop (Umberto Tozzi). Lighting by Jacques Chatelet is at times nocturnal or hharsh, using a lowered canopy of spotlights quite close tothe dancers. A symmetrical set with what looks like eight tacky polling booths, wind effects, gunshots or sounds of drilling reinforce the basic mood of spastic despair with silent spaces of indifference. There is almost never any intimacy, any tenderness (no pas de cdews); vitims and aggressors turn the tables, lie down and rise up, mimicking some ritual S/M game, The high point takes place in a round with three chairs for twelve dancers. The struggle for chairs accelerates, reaching a tempo of dizzying precision where you can feel a split second error may cause a dangerous total breakdown. There is a touch of humor with (human) gorillas—an homage to Marlene and Von Sternberg —but when they shed their garments, Preljocaj and his dancers show they are not afraid of male frontal nudity, ‘And then who cares about the trendy pseudo- intellectual wrapping of Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Conrad, whose writings and interviews about intelligent sophistication and subconscious pulsions are also used sporadically on the sound track? Yet another Woyzeck was staged by Joseph‘Nag, a multi-ethnic Magyar, born in Serbia. These brutal, cinematic fragments for a foundational 1830 unfinished play by Bachner, may fast become the end of the twentieth century's most staged drama. Not a dissident, Nadj worked in Budapest before discovering modern dance in Paris in 1980. In spite of his recent popularity he too chose to work in the small Pénitents Blancs chapel in a restricted box of 4 x 5 x3 meters, a crowded space cramped tight with shabby furniture, a bed in the wal, table end chairs, like one of those children’s books opening into a set. Props include one pound of liver and lung of pork, three raw eggs, a bag Of lentils and two red apples which will all be put to appropriate use—crushed, ingested or vomited. His Woyzeck, after so many others, is subtitled L'Ebauche ddu vertge (Sketching Vertigo)—or rather madness pethaps. His (four at first, and now seven) deformed actors include himself asthe antihero. They are made up in mud, a clan of Golem-like Lumpenmenscen, like pegs in the holes ofthis MerzKunst trap (the garbage art of Klaus Schwitters) whose very substance is made of stone, dust, water, strings and a knife. Emptied of ‘words, it sa sixty-minute condensation, transposed in images and hampered slow motion, an underworld of sub-animalistic behavior in beige lighting by Raymond Blot with cithar music by Aladar Racz. And yes, one laughs. Obvious intercessors are Kantor and Becket, ‘but Nadj has developed a masterful style of his own. The biggest crowd pleaser was Zingaro's ‘equestrian Opera Eclipse and his charismatic shaman Bartabas who is said to care more for his horses than for people. They do in fact interact, becoming each ‘other during this incessant and endless carousel of acrobats, stallions, dancers, birds and butterflies, ‘centaurs and pegasus. They make us long for forgotten worlds where humans and animals lived together in harmony instead of preying on each other. I never enjoyed trained animals, but could it be that horses actually like being trained? After the red and gold of his previous Chimére comes the spectral and mystic black and white of Eclipse. Some images evoke Loie Fuller, Leonor Fini or Cocteau accompanied by the beating of shanawl drums and the screeching unbearable female voice of the p'ansori song, both from South Korea. The two magical moments for me ‘ere actually when the horses, left alone, seemed to act con their own with no treats or morsels, no bit ‘mouthpiece, no whip in sight: the litle one who playfully pushed around the standing figure with its shoulder, and most ofall the black stallion who lay down at the center ofthe ring, under the falling snow, then raised its front legs and looked around meditatively, quizzical and full of dignity before the lights faded to black and thunderous applause. Whatever happened to the much awaited Canadian Denis Marleau’s production of Lessing’s ‘Nathan le sage (Nathan the Wise), a timely, or is it timeless or perhaps obsolete, plea for tolerance and leaming to live together? Often performed in Germany lately, banned in its time and under the Nazis, almost unknown in France, itis talkative, intimate play about moral issues of faith and war, existentialist perhaps but certainly not Brechtian, Which of ‘the three ‘monotheistic religions is the true one as illustrated in the apologue of the three rings? His answer is all is relative and there can be multiple truths. Lessing believed that even if people were predators they were still identical, regardless of religion and race. Everybody wanted to see Sami Frey in the tile role, which he accepted only on condition that he ‘would not have to shout or yell because of the Honor Cour’s acoustics. He did not, and most of the humor in the play went from the young German to him. Marleau understood that it was necessary to bring the actors closer tothe audience of 2000 spectators, so for the first time in Avignon's history, the stage was at the same level asthe fist rows and the proscenium reached even further. What went wrong could easily be remedied it seems. As it was, the actors were at times «bit remote from each other (although streamlined to eight characters without the extras) and the pace slowed down to four and a half hours because of awkward exits and entrances complicated by sliding platforms for each home. The Jerusalem set made of tubular beams suggested mosque, synagogue and steeple but the dusk brooding lighting by Guy Simard was disastrous throwing an unnecessay melancoly blanket ‘on the performance. In short I remember Berard Sobel’s 1987 first-ever staging of Nathan in French as far superior. Nevertheless this play about human rights and the right of nations to self determination deserves to be told—but Israel in 1997 is now under Netanyahu [a more extended review of Nathan le Sage appears elsewhere in ths issue}. ‘The main events for the future of French theatre were the two productions by the two most- likely-to-succeed directors: Olivier Py and Stanislas ‘Nordey both in their early thi Olivier Py created a sensation two years ago with his seven times twenty-four-hours-a-day non-stop production of his five interconnecting yet independent dramas with interludes: La Servant (the name given to the stageligh lft burning when the theater is dark). It was the most incredible piece I had seen in the lastdecade. The text itself was sheer poetry and fun, lyrical, strong and so rich in substance it sounded like @ young Paul Claudel. It boasted an inventive scenography, a joyful playfulness and seriousness, full of sensuality and packed with Christian symbolism and such a talented cast of twenty that it was easy to discard the religious message and enjoy the histrionics. ‘The above is also true for Le Visage d'Orphée which was performed three times toa packed audience and written for the Cour itself with references to the steep walls of the sanctuary, the stars in the night of Provence. Yet it also showed in a negative way, because La Servante was written from the guts, ex lo. This one isnot. The myth of Orpheus is known ‘mainly through the myth of Cocteau himself: as the eternal poet and the lover of Eurydice whom he kills a second time by turning around absentmindedly, This does not seem to have inspired Py, for Eurydice is nowhere to be seen, even if there are some desirable substitutes, but in fact neither is there much about heterosexual love. So Orpheus sans Euryéice iti, with some references. What we have instead is a another four and a half hour long play, a poem for seventeen “mouths,” without characters and psychology, about the search by a group of Orphiques—disciples for the ‘meaning of life and death, evil and art, and of course, appearances and reality. It starts with a young man Baptiste, who is a bit ofa disenchanted radical, looking for the dead poet in a kind of plaster-of-Paris workshop owned by Musée, the clownish character and his spirited weathercock (a dove, really). With the appearance of an Orpheus imposter they set out ona long meandering joumey and a long, meandering text. The litle troupe builds up until there are eight of them: Victoire, a ‘mother (the superb dowager of the French stage, Denise Gence) abused by her two predatory sons; Bienvenu, an archeologist who hates science; Lavini ‘a blue whore with a face like Godard’ Pierrot le Fou; a masochistic young man who is willingly auctioned off by her, dismembered into litle fragments (Finger, hand, ...)in an abominably revolting episode and who turns out to be the son of an old fool of a university professor (the extraordinary Bruno Sermonne, in a take off on Alain Cuny). They are eight orphic disciples on the road: a voyage of thespians as in Angelopoulos and s films, in search of a text and a -ventually an eight word oracle, multiplied ieces of paper passed on to the audience ‘which says: “Fils de la Terre et du ciel étoile” (Son of the Earth and the starry sky). They descend to Hell after intermission, with a stage strewn with dead bodies. But perhaps iti useless to go on since this afterall a charade. Could it be “Jesus in "97"? The astonishing fact is that Py fills the whole huge Honor Court with its 800 square meter stage and one does not feel like leaving because itis superb (verbal) theater, Jubilant and full of hope, because he drives a scandalous DS (a pun on déesse/goddess) Citroen on the very boards where Vilar and Philipe played, because of the sheer mind-blowing gall of this actor/author prancing and dancing stark naked as the eucumical and chubby god Pan. Als grace. All is prayer. Evil does not exist and Praise the Lord! As you probably gathered there is no sanctimonious proselytisng just a good natured, outgoing young man ‘who thinks it perfectly natural to address his audience as siblings or friends, in the spirit of “Let's do something we don’t know how to do,” who appeals to you with a conviction that is heartwarming and a message you may not want. I have the greatest admiration for Olivier Py and his optimistic energy which made him a participant, with Ariane Mnouchkine and Maguy Marin, two summers ago in a hunger strike that lasted four weeks in the hope of convincing the Chirac Government to finally involve itself in the Bosnian war. An incredibly courageous if untimely stand, yet two years later, there isno trace of bitterness nor political ‘commitment in Orphée—dommage in a way! Stanislas Nordey, quite the opposite of Py, is «feverish yet controlled, lean, hungry and diaphanous actor-drector, not an author. He has done some splendid work with Hervé Guibert, Heiner Maller and Genet. He shares with Py a totally endearing sincerity inthe vein of “Let’s do a play I don’t understand” with no fear of displeasing the audience, with a knack for provocation. In the space of ten years, this is his third staging of Marivaux’s La Dispute (1744), a play which intrigues him because he finds it distasteful and imelevant,Itis however a playlet most often performed in the U.S, precisely because it is quite different (with Lille des Esclaves) from his other plays with their quintessential Marivaudage on Goldoni patterns, for which he is celebrated. It was popular in the sixties maybe because of their dionysiac or slightly twisted Garden of Eden premise. For the entertainment and enlightenment of a princely couple, who are arguing whether man or woman was first responsible for infidelity, two boys and two girls now eighteen, have been raised without being aware of the opposite sex. They quickly discover sexuality, narcissism, jealousy, rivalry and infidelity, The fact isthe answer is moot,but the males turn out to be much better sports than the females—a mysogynistic aspect of Marivaux? This enigmati short piece (fifteen pages in the complete theatre opus) has already attracted among those I have seen: Chéreau, the Robertson Rep plus many others in California and Andrei Serban recently at La Mama in New York. Nordey’s staging (in which he also performs) is stripped of sets because he likes the very walls where he is working, He uses only some eighteenth-century garments in bare feet. A barren stage and most of all, pure light (which, by the way, would have pleased Vilar). When asked why his cast kept their trench coats instead of baring it all (as did Serban’s), Nordey's miffed ‘answer was that there were “technical problems. But what is it to us ? As if it were not enough, he used a monologue by prose writer Vincent Ravalec on AIDS and an opaque text written previously for ‘Amnesty Intemational by Didier-Georges Gabily (who died during a rehearsal in 1996) which he wrapped around Marivaux. La Dispute’s “question +écréative” becomes a grim Contention extending into contemporary twentieth- century domestic violence. A man strangles his wife (hail Althusser), another is dying of AIDS, and another sells his children into prostitution (the text was written before the pedophilia paranoia syndrome). The three hour performance caused disgust, perplexity and rejection. Many walked out. A sure sign that thanks to Py and Nordey, something is stirring in the French theatre today. The sheer energy of Flemish youth from the suburbs of Ghent, Belgium was the magic ingredient in Bernadeyje (Little Bernadette). Of course the five bumper cars (autos tamponneuses in France, auto scooters in Belgium) helped also. The team of Ame Sierens for the jive and Alain Platel, a choreographer—whose Tristeza complice with his Ballet C(ontemporain) de la B(elgique) played at the Joyce in New York last Spring—delivers a stunning evening. Imagine a real fairground or kermis square rink with a neon, metalic floor and electrical canopy. ‘The characters are an assortment of street youth, male and female, brothers and sisters and friends and a tacky Bernat Avignon, Photo: Kst Van de lst ‘mother who is looking for Francesca. The off-the-wall title is a wink at The Song of Bernadette. The way they dress in tom Tshirts and unbuttoned jeans, aping ‘American cool, the way they speak French with a heavy Dutch accent (a recent challenge from their native Flemish dialect for the benefit of Avignon) add a different touch to the terse, gross yet funny, minimal dialogue about lovers and friends, not forgetting parenls. Nothing much is going on: there isan absurd adult wedding somewhere off stage, a taxi driver is losing his job, a dead rat, a loud and sexy Polish girl whom nobody understands even when she tells an elaborate joke or gets angry because of her lost passport. There is fll blast lip-synching to American rock plus the flag and one of the most beautifulsequences of the whole festival: a straying bumper car driven dreamily by a girl with three young males hanging aboard, is slowly going round and round to a Bach Cantata as if it were the Raft of the Medusa, Incredible. ‘Anglo-saxon theater never had top billing in Avignon. This year there was William Kentridge with his puppet and live actors’ rendering of Ubu and the Truth (and Reconciliation) Commission, performed in English, South Afrikaans and dialect. It is based on the semi-legal 1996 Hearing on Human Rights abuse. Transcripts of victims and torturers, newsreels are combined with animation but it is actually a play in its own right by South African author Jane Taylor. It is also a daring exercise in cross-cultural communication: Jarry’s Ubu is not much known in Capetown (Jarry’s publisher, Ambroise Vollard, actually wrote a sequel titled Ubu Colonial) just as we may not be aware of racial atrocities committed in the thirty years before Apartheid came to an end. Ubu is a white bully, a blue-print of the essential infantile, sadistic and childlike dictator claiming irresponsability. Ma Ubu is 1 black Mother Earth. Both are actors. We watch in disbelief as the Grotesque and the Horror blend for the final appalling bitter truth: amnesty to the killer/butchers for telling the truth, white-washing for the confession of their crimes. ‘The Other Avignon, OFF In comparison with last year, the Off Festival appeared much weaker than usual. Although | attended some thirty offerings only a handful were worth their modest price of admission. Quickly the well-deserved word-of-mouth award went to everybody's favorite: 2500 a Wheure (per hour)—not miles but years—a ‘marvellous romp through the history of Western theater by the Theatre de I'Unité, under Jacques Livchine—all in one hour. A celebration of “an ar that hasn't made any progress since $00 BC” whose function is telling lies in order to convey overwhelming emotions by an endearing company of five thespians performing ‘empty-handed without a safety net and the help of some uplifting film sound tracks. It is total chaos at ‘once bawdy, intelligent, ender, hilarious, demystifying (The Seagull is not; Iam an actress"). It zooms and ‘Tae de Unité, 2500 8 hewre, Phot: Ladoswishes full speed from the Greeks to the Middle Ages tothe Globe and Kantor and the Living Theatre, all of Moligre’s thirty-three plays in ninety seconds as against Shakespeare's thirty-seven, to a poignant and rousing finale as an hommage to the greatest moments: “We will remember...” My second choice would be Vagues de Nuit (Night waves) directed by Michel Lopez, actor and teacher, written for two characters split into four actors; there are two Elsas and two Franks (and a special ‘mention to Caroline Archambault). Around a flapping door, the back seat ofa taxi and a sofa bed we witness the combat and tango of the sexes, longing and hysteria, erying and laughing, brutal and loving, the whole out of control gamut of the love panic, stuttering and frenetic, an overlapping, disjointed, contradictory ping-pong of a play The Hecub Company staged Israel Horowitz's latest opus Lebensraum in fifty parts for three actors on, guilt, shame and denial in Germany about the Holocaust, set in the twenty-first century when a German chancellor in a gesture of anachronistic good will and atonement invites 6 million Jews to come back ‘with predictable catastrophic results (unemployment, neo-Nazis and new Jews stirred by the Mossad). Zapping from the U.S. to Deutschland, the play flashes headlines, Powerful and yet abit shallow. "Nie wider” is the (im)probable echoing at the end. istophe Lidon, one of the most gifted independent directors and his Compagnie La Nuit et le Moment, who did Goldoni and Marivaux to perfection, has taken a turn towards a somber mood. He wants to remind us that of course there is a class struggle awareness prevalent in Moliére, So Georges Dandin in turn-of-the-century garb becomes a Zola nightmare ‘with the protagonist commiting suicide at the end. In the same vein the comedy of doubles Amphytrion, as seen by Frangoise Roche for the Reims based ‘Compagnie C’est la Nuit, emphasizes the militaristic background and becomes an acrimomious shouting ‘match between masters and servants, men and women, Love's labor is lost forever and Molitre isthe loser. On the positive side I did enjoy Jeanne Champagne’s adaptation of two autobiographical novels by Jules Vallés (1881), L'Enfant et Le Bachelier, an abused child and an angry young man LEnfany, directed by Charnpsgne. Photo: Fora Mein, 3before he turns militant anarchist. Denis Léger-Milhau is lovable but perhaps there is too much good humor ‘and not enough anger here. In a display rich in disappointments, should I point to the Compagnie Sortie de Route under Thierry Chantere!? Their Chez les Tich last year was the best, but Montserrat, (Venezuela) by Emmanuel Robles through no fault of| 4 talented cast remains a heavy period piece dated 1946; an existential dilema between resistance and retaliation. Who and what triggers the escalation of violence? And what about innocent women and children, a theme also treated by Sartre, Beauvoir and Camus? Nice try, although 1 am not sure the company’s versatile characteristic trait of switching cast without warning serves the writer. ‘Xavier Durringer’s plays about “what is wrong with youth today"—jobless, aimless, homy, hanging out, caught between love and sex—are never ‘moralizing, since all is seen from their point of view in Bal Trap and Une petite Entaille (A Little Notch). Alas the two average productions here for four and twelve thespians respectively, made me painfully aware how ‘much ofthis theatre depends on the blend of cruelty, aggressivity and vulnerability of the cast and the vim and energy of the director. Durringer's brand of stylized realism needs a Mathieu Kassovitz, One can only hope that they will meet soon, (On the totally negative side, one wonders what Possesses anyone to adapt a film masterpiece on the stage with the inevitable negative result from the comparison? After having been caught at The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. and Singing in the Rain on Broadway, I realized a long time ago, it was a hopeless, suicidal proposition. Such was the case once more for Une Partie de Campagne, Guilene Ferré’s adaptation of Renoir. There were a great deal of four-,three-, and tworcharacter plays for obvious financial reasons. Yet another version of Maller's Quartet with Jean-Philippe Ecoffey, an excellent film actor as Valmont’ Tourvel/Volanges. A delicate hommage to Colette by Isa Mercure: La Chambre aux reflets (The Reflecting Room) mainly about her mother Sido and how to age alone and serene. The plethora of inevitable one- Person shows I saw, included texts by Albert Cohen, Genet, Koltés and Guérin, To sum up: with some exceptions, it was a rather lackluster independent OfT Festival Is it because the official IN festival was so truly exciting in terms of the cross-cultural exchange, the welcome extended to Russia, the multi-disciplinary expansion towards dance, mime, circus, puppets and the unusual opportunity granted to young directors who faced the challenge with gall and true grit? ‘The West-meets-east-of-Europe trend will be extended into next year and will incorporate Asian theatre—Taiwan and South Korea are expected to participate since China has shown some reluctance in the guise of visa problems and excessive financial demands. It is Faivre d’Arcier who will carry the Festival to the threshold of the next millenium. Bon ‘courage et bonne chanceNathan the Wise: A Tranquil Force Denis Marleau in Avignon Josette Féral Its uncontestable that Denis Marleau seems a little out of place in Quebec's theatrical landscape—almost extraterrestrial yet original, and ‘utique. From his first productions in the 1980s, white the Théétre Ubu was only taking its first steps, he entered Quebees theatre scene as an outsider, opening 2 gap in the dominant panorama of the theatre ofthe time, His artistic approach—which brought dadai texts to loca stages—revealed a highly stylized acting style endowed with a precise technique, in which the factors’ vocal and physical prowess surprised and seduced an enthousiastie public. ‘The ensuing productions undermined all attempts to classify the artist and all those who readied themselves to speak of a Marleau acting style. Beside Merz Opera (1987) and Luna-Park (1992) which put the Merzian and futurist texts of Block, Khlebnikov, Mayakovsky, Kroutchonyek and Gouro on stage and Which maintained the impression of deliberately ‘modem dramaturgical choices, mises-en-scéne like Oulipo Show by Queneau, Calvino and Copeau, ike Pasolni's Théoréme, Jarry's Ubu Cyele, or Kagel’s La trahison orale only confirmed Marleau’s predilection for the texts which established the modemity of our epoch. ‘These texts also allowed him the space and liberty to travel outside of theatrical tradition. Moreover, they frequently allowed him to import the techniques of montage and collage to the stage. The artist was henceforth recognized by the public for a certain ludic quality in his work. These choices permitted Marleau to “deepen a certain work on the vocal resources, on the performatvity ofthe actor in relation to texts which are impossible to speak from a naturalist point of view. To favor the hybrid meetings between the theatre and the visual arts, music, and dance." These texts and techniques have contributed to f theatrical renewal in Quebec, reinseribing local practice in the continuity of a global history from Which it was too frequently eut off Paradoxically, Marleau's subsequent mises- en-scéne displaced even this vision. Denis Marleau has stayed faithful only to himself. He has not stopped surprising the public—foiling attempts to pigeon-hole him and tackling texts seemingly distant from his first strikes. J-M. Koltés’ Roberto Zucco was a fist 1s surprise, a mise-en-scéne in which one felt very strongly the vision of the director. Equally clear were choices of stylized play which gave force and sense to the ensemble. Renewed with the dramaturgy of the forbidden and the extreme (a dramatugy he had already ‘begun with his productions of Mishima and Pasolini), Marleau’s directing found a force in which one felt the desire to bring life's tragique to the theatre. It was a vision served admirably by Michel Goulet's scene designs. Then there was Buchner's Woyzeck, Wedekind’s Lulu, Thomas Bemnhard's Les Maitres anciens, and Chaurette's Le passage de I'Indiana Marleau tackled strictly theatrical texts; in a certain, sense, they were the more classic ones, where the director must listen tothe text and its author above all Each time Marleau innovated; he tried to free himself from his work habits and to forget what he had done previously in order to keep himself open. His approach became almost classic—that of a director possesed of 1 strong personal vision but whose priority remained fidelity to the text and the play. ‘When I stage a work like Roberto Zucco, | ‘am a director completely at the service of the play. I don’t ask myself any questions; I enter into the text. For that, I must not want to do the work of an auteur. In Becket, as in Koltés, you find writings rich enough to be able to travel in them and understand how the plays were contructed, how their poetic visions were organized,” he remarked. ‘A Powerful Dramaturgy 1t is within this framework that one must locate the production of Nathan le Sage presented by Denis Marieau in the Cour d°honneur of the Palais des Papes in Avignon in July 1997. It is a strong work which the public, seduced last year by Les Matires ‘anciens, eagerly anticipated. There was neither a pitched battle nor delirious enthousiasm but the public welcomed the play very warmly. On the other hand, the critics were more divided. While recognizing Marleau's uncontestable talent, they were disappointed that the production was not as dazzling as his productions at Avignon the previous year. This cleavage between the public and thetities observed in relation to Nathan le Sage is common at Avignon as it is, moreover, in a more general way in the culture. The spectator often has the impression that the critics rarely share their enthousiasms and their disappointments. This is the ‘ase to such an extent that one sometimes wonders in whose name criticism speaks, to whom itis addressed, and to what end. To confront the Cour d’honneur—one of the ‘most important stages in the world due to its presti and the symbolic meaning it harbors—is therefore a huge challenge to undertake. It is a stage where numerous directors and choreographers have singed their wings and from which some have let destroyed One doesn’t occupy a stage this vast lightly. The place is historically charged and the walls—the wall behind the stage in particular—is crowded with memories for the loyal spectator. It is there, present, terribly present, and imposing. ‘Therefore, Denis Marleau invested the Cour with a play fitting the dimensions of the place, a colossal play, a monument infrequently performed on French stages: Nathan the Wise. This work by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing is central to the ‘contemporary German repertoire. Written at the height of the Enlightenment, this pioneering work was the ‘most perfect expression of Aufklarung. rationalist ‘humanism. It served as the model for the reform of all German theatre which would follow. Staged in 1783, ‘wo years after its author’s death, the play was a failure and was not performed for many years despite its many printings during the nineteenth century. This neglect is doubtless explained by the heavy cost ofthe whole of the work. However, Lessing's play is an ‘example of Enlightenment thinkers’ ideal—the harmonious fusion of rationalism and sentiment. Closer to Diderot and Voltare's theatre of ideas than to the neo-classical theatre which preceeded it and which Lessing refuted, Nathan the Wise is a combative, polemic work which Lessing published two years before his death. It seems like a testimony of the profound convictions which oriented his life Forbidden by the Nazis during the war because of i ‘ideology and the ideas it promoted, it was produced on all German stages after the war's end and today remains in the repertoire of numerous state theatres in Germany. ‘The work is, therefore, highly significant. It has a running time of four and a half hours without cuts, Ithad never been staged in France before Bernard Sobel’s production almost ten years ago. Denis Marleau takes up the text ina new translation which he 16 executed with Elizabeth Morf, going over those 4,000 verses to give them a more contemporary lavor. The subject i very current since it treats tolerance between the three foundational religions: Judaism, Christianity, and islam Lessing wrote Nathan the Wise in 1779. At the time he was the librarian in the Duchy of Brauschweig and had been involved for several years ina virulent polemic with Pastor Geoze of Hamburg. Hamburg’s intolerance would not stand for the theological questioning Lessing published in “Fragments d'un anonyme” [Anonymous Fragments] It is true that Lessing had sown the seeds of doubt about the idea of divine revelation and on the supremacy of the Christian religion by publishing texts—unknown until then—of renowned theologians imerrogating certain precepts previously esteemed as uncontestable truths. The quarrel achieved such Proportions that Frederic the Great intervened and ordered his subject to cease all polemic and to submit all of his writing to censorship from that moment on Forced nto silence, Lessing decided retun to the theatre to promote his ideas. He made the play he envisaged—Nathan the Wise—a masterly dramatic [poem which promoted his ideas and became the most beautiful example of the spirit of tolerance, humanism and philanthropy of the Enlightenment. Questions of tolerance and of the rapports between faith and reason —which he had already broached in some of the texts of his youth—are posed. It goes without saying that behind this huge undertaking Lessing desired above all to castigate the intolerance of certain Christians around him to which the Templar, the Patriarch, and Daja offer a dramaturgical contrast. His message therefore is a message of tolerance. Nathan the Wise is at once a philosophical story, a bourgeois drama, and an oriental tale. So for Denis Marleau Nathan the Wise isa seductive choice. Aside from the importance of the Play inthe world repertoire and its “arity” on stag, it allowed the artist to explore an eighteenth-century dramaturgy, an epoch he had never taken on before. Marleau’s fascination for German literature is not recent. He has already explored the foundations of German theatricality several times; he has staged Buchner, Wedekind, and Bernhard. So Lessin is only «further step inthis exploration ofa dramaturgy whose fierceness and modernity ae intiguing. From one text to the next, one notices that the works chosen by Marleau feature characters who pose the question of| identity in our modem world with acuity. It is an identity forged in our relationships to others and toAne ourselves—sometimes difficult relationships, often superficial ones—from which the subject always emerges on a quest for him/herself. The perspective of Nathan the Wise is completely different. The characters seem to have a strong identity—a religious identity above all—but in the course ofthe text, in certain characters, this identity cracks, permitting other realities to come to the fore. Splitting Identities, ‘The play takes place in the twelfth century during the third crusade. It shows Nathan, a rich Jew, retuming from a very long voyage who, upon his return, discovers that his daughter Récha had almost perished ina fire, Saved from the flames by a passing Templar, Récha dedicates herself completely to her savior whom she had barely seen and whom she ‘confounds with an angel. The Templar was pardoned by Saladin, sultan of Jerusalem because Saladin noticed a resemblance between his brother and the Templar. Sought out by Récha who wants to thank him, the ‘Templar eludes her, not wanting to have any commerce with a Jew. Informed of his daughter's desire, Nathan ilere and Aurion Recoing rehearsing Nathan the Wis, Photo: Gérard Rondeau thanks the Templar and invites him over, Although reticent at first to meet with a Jew, the Templar ends up being won over and falls in love at first sight with the young woman. He divulges his feelings to Nathan who displays a certain reserve. The Templar misinterprets this reserve and takes offense. He attributes the father’s lack of enthousiasm to religious pprejudice—Récha being Jewish and he CChristian—before realizing that Nathan's prudence was due only to wisdom and his desire to verify the blood- relationship possibly existing between them. In point of fact, the subsequent events and revelations show everyone that Récha isthe adopted daughter of Nathan, ‘She was raised in the Jewish religion but was originally Christian. However, just as this revelation is made public, another arrives to correct it. Far from being Christian, Récha and the Templar are in fact the two children of Saladin’s brother, a Muslim who had ‘married a Christian woman and who was subsequently killed in combat. All characters are reconciled with ‘one another. Récha will not marry the Templar but she finds in him the brother toward whom she naturally felt affinity Such isthe part of the story akin to bourgeois,drama, The characters meet, fallin love, and watch their love easily transformed into fraternal ties. Revelations abound in the second part in which discussions between characters dominate over action, Indeed, the bourgeois drama (which assures the character dynamic) is undergirded by a philosophical tale much more profound and central to the play; it constitutes both its heart and meaning. The three principal characters each represent one of the dominant religions of the Occidental world: Nathan is Jewish, the Templar is Christian, Saladin is Muslim. A ‘certain mutual understanding and respect unites Nathan and Saladin. Both are tolerant (Nathan more so than Saladin) and try to understand and listen to each other. ‘The younger Templar comes across as a fanatic. He is @ fanatic who ultimately turns out well through listening to the voice of reason, but who makes some ‘mistakes along the way in the thrall of a poorly- understood faith. Although Nathan is without a doubt the great wise man of the play—he who repeatedly ‘opposes the calm of his reasoning to the passions and traps which surround him—Saladin does not lack open- ‘mindedness and a certain cunning wisdom, ‘Thus Nathan, challenged to say which religion is the truest, recounts a parable that Lessing borrows from the Decameron of Boccacio; the parable constitutes the central point of the play. It tells the story of a ring passed down in a single family from generation to generation, from father to his preferred son. This ring, once passed on, makes “agreeable to God and to men” whoever possesses it. Over the years, it happens that a father, loving each of his three sons equally and not wanting to decide between them, has ‘made two rings identical to the first and gives one to cach of his children at the moment of his death. Once the father is dead, the sons, suddenly aware that theit father has tricked them, want to know which of their rings is the unique, original and only true one, and they call on a judge to decide which possesses the truth. But the judge, unable to distinguish among the three rings tells them of the equal love that their father bore them, and invites them to show themselves worthy of it. From that moment on, the truth is that of the three rings and no longer of one among them. A parable about religions, this story clearly recapitulates work's ‘message, that a multiple truth must be accepted. ‘This story, which answers Saladin’s question, clearly affirms that no religion is more true than another. They are all true to the extent that those who follow them show themselves worthy of the principles that each religion conveys. Impressed by this lesson, Saladin decides not to borrow from Nathan the money hhe needs to replenish his supplies and carry out his ‘wars, and he retains a certain respect for Nathan. In fact, it appears that, beyond religious differences, certain gestures that Nathan and Saladin hhave made draw them together: Nathan has saved ‘young Christian and raised her as his daughter; Saladin ihas saved a young Templar despite the fact that the latter has come to retake Jerusalem from the Muslims. Now the rescued young woman and the Templar are brother and sister. A long preparation we might say to make of these young people Christians, Jews, and Muslims al atthe same time. ‘The lesson needs restating in today's tom world where religious wars rage again. In a context where extremism and isolation are multiplying, Marleau’s staging of Nathan the Wise is a particularly happy idea. ‘At a time when one often questions the appropriateness of a director's dramaturgical choice, it is fortunate that Denis Marleau has selected a work sorich in meaning. The theatre is restored to its basic function: speaking to us about the society that surrounds us. The choices are all full of risk: the text is long, the theological discussions numerous, the style rather verbose, the action not very dramatic and the principal characters taken as a group do not offer the portrayal of any consuming passion but rather of a reason which remains the master ofthe emotions. Only the young people (Récha and the Templar) and the secondary characters (Daja and the Patriarch) give in to ‘a dangerous fanaticism which could have had dramatic ‘consequences had it not been immediately mastered by those who could have been destroyed by it. {A Spectacle for the Ear The production designed by Marleau for this ‘monument is one of respect and of the most careful attention tothe work and the text. The effect is not one of spectacle but of a type of oratorio where the emphasis is upon word and argument. Each word spoken by the characters is important. Thus a treatise on tolerance is constructed before our eyes bit by bit, maxim by maxim, with Nathan unquestionably its central figure. Wise and rich, respected by everyone around him, generous with his goods, he imposes himsetf on all. The view that he has of things, beings, and circumstances is benevolent and always rational ‘When his entourage is alarmed by certain events (the ‘meeting at Saladin’ quarters for example o a those of| Sittah, the Sultan’s sister), Nathan remains calm and master ofthe situation. At the same time the charactershows a certain emotion on two occasions, a quickly dominated disquiet or curiosity—in Act I, scene i when he leams that his daughter has almost perished in a fire and Act IV scene vii when the Lay Brother reveals to him that he isthe person who brought him a baby a few weeks old asking him to save it. Aside from these ‘moments when the paternal chord of Nathan vibrates warmly, there are few scenes in which emotion is manifested. We are indeed in a time which values reason overall the passions. How can one be surprised then that the performance of Nathan by Sami Frey is perfectly adapted to this role, sober and completely restrained? By selecting Sami Frey, Denis Marleau wanted to ‘change the traditional image of Nathan, that of an old man rendered wise by age. Considering the personality ‘of Sami Frey, more a cinema actor than a theatre actor—but an equally charismatic person on stage and sereen—the public is coming to see a myth. Sami Frey has faced up to this role. Seduced by the character of "Nathan, he has given him a youthful allure despite his sixty years, along with the presence that he incontestably carries with him. Although reserved, the character become imposing by this presence. He remains dignified, serene, emotionally reserved, as if free of passion. If it is the case that the spectator sometimes would like a warmer and more dynamic performance, the choice of this interpretation is easily explained by saying thatthe character of Nathan is that ‘of a man severely wounded by life, in that he has lost his wife and his seven sons in the war against the Muslims. He has therefore no reason to rejoice even if time and reason seem to have healed his wounds. ‘Nathan will live out the rest of his life calmly, without suffering, almost without surprise, leaving such stimulus to those around him. Nathan the Wise is thus a ttle with a double ‘meaning. First there is that wisdom which gives him riches. This permits him to show a generosity which necessarily leads to consideration for those around him. ‘Then there is also that wisdom given him by reason which gives him that quiet power which inevitably finds a solution to all problems. It is therefore no surprise that the interpretation of Sami Frey has opted for a powerful reserve. One feels at the same time that there is a disturbance seated in the heart of the character derived from patemal bonds, a disturbance that has nothing to do with the wealth of Nathan or with his personal well-being, but concerns only the relations with his daughter. Its interesting to note that the two scenes when Nathan depart from his reserve at least for the space of a few lines both are concerned with the possibilty of losing his daughter: that is, the first scene of Act I when he learns that she has nearly been bumed alive and scene vii of Act IV when he wishes to remain the father of Récha abit longer if that is possible In this same sense of rupture, the playing of the first part and that of the second is contrasted tothe extent that a certain agitation is manifested in the last two acts of the story, when the plot is tied up and untied. Its indeed at this time thatthe action speeds up around the revelation of the religion of Récha at her birth. The delight of Daj the Christian governess of Reécha, and the passion of the Templar te up the plot, involuntarily placing Nathan and his daughter in danger from the character ofthe Patriarch (Gabriel Gascon) —a dogmatic and intolerant character who embodies all that Lessing hated in fanatics. Itis important to rapidly illuminate the past. Nathan, preoccupied with saving that which is most precious to him, does not direct his efforts toward revealing the truth, a truth which will serve him at the end of the action since then he can no longer hide anything and. remains the father of Récha. The performance of the actors is inscribed ‘within this reading. And the casting of French actos in the leading roles and Québécois actors in supporting cones has wisely followed. Aurélien Recoing presents an impatient and prodigious but sympathetic Saladin, ‘Anne Caillére an enthusiastic and volatile Récha, Serge Dupirea rather melancholy Templar somewhat lacking in impetuosity, while the Patriarch played by Gabriel Gascon is as detestable as one could wish. Others in the cast are Christine Murillo as Daja, Micheline Bernard as Sittah, and Philippe Faure a the lay brother. This is a theatre of ideas which demonstrates a truth—which is precisely the possible multiplicity of truths. One fels during the course of the performance that the moments important to Lessing are the philosophical debates, those involved with theological is precisely these moments that Denis Marleau’s direction has picked up to present without display or ostentation. Marleau has several times affirmed the importance that he gives to the text In a 1988 interview he said: “The text is certainly important in my work. What I want comes primarily from there. Whatever is happening in the rehearsal room I am. seeking the spectacle in its totality, with the text and through the text. For me, theatre is as much for the ear as for the eye. I do not subscribe to this idea of the Visual theatre or of the theatre of images. It seems ‘obvious to me that the theatre cannot let itself be reduced to a single dimension. Several languages or‘writings are superimposed on a text which is put on stage; itis like an accumulation of colors on a canvas. r in other words, a performance materializes with the aid of all the senses, in a complex manner that is both real and symbolic ... as one can visualize voices, touch the things seen, make visible the words heard.” ‘The production of Nathan the Wise confirms this profession of faith. Everything has been designed to make the text understood. The scenography of Michel Goulet is somber and metallic, made up of pipes evoking oriental illuminations. It outlines volumes—symbolic space whose peculiarity is to be simultaneously alike and different. Different in that they clearly represent the cultic locations corresponding to the different religions (the synagogue with its star of| David for Nathan, the minaret and crescent for Saladin, the church dome and cross for the Templar), alike in that the architecture of these places is. similar Moreover they remain open to each other without ‘enclosure or rupture, clearly showing that basically, as in the tale of the rings, they are almost identical ‘Neighboring each other, even overlapping, the palm ‘court where the Templar walks, Nathan's house and Saladin's palace are only slightly differentiated by rather discreet religious symbols at the rear ofthe stage. These pipes create catwalks, staircases, bridges and various platforms which break up the surface into difference spaces, obliging the actors to pursue wandering courses suggesting the passage from ‘one place to another. On the ground different mosaics give to the floor a color and warmth which compensates abit for the coldness of the metal. They also suggest by the authenticity of tangible signs the Jerusalem of today. There again, although the mosaics are different according to the location, they nevertheless remain similar to each other, thus creating, beyond the surface distinctions, a common space upon ‘which the differences are traced. This space also in its ‘way plays out again Nathan’s message. ‘The moving stages reserved for Saladin and the Templar move in and out according to the requirements ofthe action, following a procedure used before by Marleau in Roberto Zucco. The result is to create a rather strong closeness between the spectators and the stage despite the immensity of the courtyard, It is also true that, in order to create this closeness, Denis Marleau did not hesitate to require that more than two hundred seats infront ofthe stage be raised so that the actors could be nearer the spectators. ‘This setting has been much criticized for not having utilized the wall of the Papal Palace, that wall which has often imposed its presence on bare stage 20 productions like the Shakespeare plays of Mnouchkine fr the dances of Pina Bausch. But Denis Marleau’s choice was deliberate. One might rather regret it for it is true that the scenography as it has been conceived does not seem to be related in any way to the space for which it was conceived. It will, on the contrary, be able to be moved without difficulty and without doubt will suggest in enclosed spaces a depth that the ‘immensity ofthe courtyard removed from it. It is also true that this setting serves the text admirably and its complexity compensates for the straightforwardness of the play. It forces the actors to live through their very bodies the displacements of the characters and to inscribe distance where the limits ofthe stage must at last telescope together the different locales ‘corresponding to each religion. This play of similarity/ difference is also present in the costumes. All the ‘characters wear tunics and belts cut in a similar fashion, Only the color of the fabrics and the headgear (kipa, turban, etc.) serve as distinguishing signs of difference, fone considers that Nathan the Wise puts on stage not psychologies but types, manners of action, and if one also considers the fact, as Diderot notes, that ‘one should put on stage not characters but conditions, then it is possible to understand how extremely faithful the staging of Denis Marleau has been to Lessing's design. Having adopted an attitude of respect toward the text, to simply listening to it without great effects and striking moments, Marleau has allowed Lessing's text and its message to be heard. Preferring not to {impose on ita strong scenic vision (of which we know he is capable) he has preferred to listen and has chosen a stripped down interpretation in order to present the text in all its clarity. As certain critics have noted, he thas “served the text with loyalty” and given proof of an “intelligent discretion.” As wourd’hui quite accurately put it “It has been a long time since we saw so clearly in the Avignon night!” ‘Ata time when almost everywhere in Europe and especially on French stages one sees ever increasing scenic elaboration, at a moment when the theatre is distinguished by a concern with beautiful images despite the protests of many directors, at a ‘moment finally when many texts are chosen with no concer for their relation to the problems of our time, it is a pleasure to see on the stage a stripped down production closely tied to the service of a text which speaks to our current concerns, (This article was first published in French in Jeu Cahiers du Thédtre) ‘Trans. Marvin Carlson and Erin HurleyDidier Bezace and Pereira Prétend, Avignon, 1997 Benjamin Camey Beginning asa group of student performers at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Pars in 1964, Theatre de ‘Aquarium has become one of France's most highly respected, and certainly one of its longest-lived, experimental theatre companies. Even in France, with is relatively enlightened system of government arts subsidies, Theatre de Aquarium is that rarity, a non-traditional theatre ‘company with a consistent artistic vision that has not only survived but grown, building a large, faithful audience and receiving critical acclaim. During France's cultural revolution ofthe late 1960s, the youthful activists of Theatre de I’ Aquarium. joined other visual and performance artists, including ‘Ariane Mnouchkine and her Théétre du Soleil collective, to squat in an abandoned munitions factory, the now famous Cartoucherie, in Vincennes. Six ‘months later Thedire de I’ Aquarium produced is first professional production, Les Evasions de Monsieur Voisin, a collective creation which toured the country and enjoyed two well-received engagements in Paris ‘The company's reputation continued to grow in the 1970s with the critical and popular success of its Cartoucherie productions. T met Thédtre de I'Aquarium in the summer of 1977, in Baltimore, where 1 was a member of the producing team for TNT I and I, the first international experimental theatre festivals held inthe United States. The company, with Didier Bezace playing a lead role, performed its first real hit, La Jeune Lume tient la velle lune toute la nuit dans ses bras. The play had just completed a six-month, sold-out run at the Cartoucherie. It was a stirring examination of labor strife in France with a message of hope for the country's struggling working class. In Baltimore, audiences were taken with what I called the company’s “anti-spectacle.” The play's design and execution were characterized by the utmost simplicity. The production's physical elements (Getting, lights, props, etc.) had none of the standard pyrotechnical excesses so often seen in experimental offerings of the 1970s. There was a strike banner, a ‘cut-out moon floating above the performance area, and simple, color-washed lighting schemes to indicate place and mood. The actors’ performances, in like manner, were straightforward characterizations—simple, 2 accessible and relaxed. The effect of allthis quiet and assured simplicity was riveting. Perhaps I had wearied Of the impenetrable imagery and overwrought styles prevalent at the festivals, however exciting they may have been, but I remember Théitre de I’ Aquarium as. an oasis of mature, thoughtful work which greatly affected me, Didier Bezace became the principal director for the company early in the 1980s. In 1984, 1986 and 1988 he directed company productions that were invited to perform in the Avignon Theatre Festival. By this time, Thédtre de l'Aquarium had become solidly established, both artistically and professionally, enjoying consistent critical recognition and steadily ‘growing audiences. Bezace, meanwhile, was recognized as a visionary director with a particular talent for adapting literature for the stage. ‘At the 1996 Avignon Festival, Bezace presented a reading of Pereira Prétend, a novel by the Italian writer Antonio Tabucchi. (The French irregular verb “pretend” has no literal translation in English, ‘The word refers to a person's presentation of self, a necessarily unique assertion of one’s being.) The Festival organizers then invited Bezace to prepare a theatrical adaptation for the 1997 event. ‘This year’s Avignon Festival coincided with visit [intended to make to France so I arranged to see the performance and speak with Monsieur Bezace. I looked forward to renewing an old acquaintance as well as the opportunity to see how Thédtre de Aquarium’s current work compared with the work that I so much enjoyed twenty years ago. Pereira Prétend was to be the third element of a trilogy of theatrical adaptations called C'est pas facile (it's Not Easy). Earlier, Bezace had created plays based on writings by Bertolt Brecht and by Emmanuel Bove, a litle-known French author. All three plays examine the disturbing phenomenon of individual ‘conscience paralyzed by the weight of history and by overwhelming social forces, specifically Fascism, Tabucchi’s novel is set in Lisbon, Portugal, in 1938, Pereira is a journalist who finds himself unable to speak out as the Fascists gain power. At this crucial ‘moment in history he is lost. He is silent—and horrified by his paralysis. He tries to break this silence that so oppresses him, but repeatedly fails. Eventually,‘and inexplicably, itis chance encounters with a young Jewish woman and a young man, a fellow writer, that allow Pereira to discover his personal “raison du coeur” and make a simple act of resistance which frees him, Bezace and the company’s earlier Brecht and Bove adaptations were well-received by both critics and the public. The theme of the trilogy clearly has particular relevance to French audiences as forces on the right continue to grow in that country. Pereira Prétend enjoyed sold-out performances throughout the festival The final festival performance of Pereira Prétend tok place at 10:00 p.m. on July 19 inthe open courtyard of the Cloitre des Carmes, a beautifully ruined thirteenth-century structure that has been for years one of the festival’s principal performance Venues. A recorded trumpet fanfare called the audience (more than 500 people) to enter the cloister. Risers ‘with comfortable theatre seats rose on the north side of | the courtyard. A large (40” x 30°), gently raked, bare wooden platform filled most of the courtyard’s open space, Behind the platform, arches revealed a cloister passageway. Lighting instruments were fixed to the Famparts of all four cloister walls and on metal aridwork suspended over the platform. ‘The setting was inherently theatrical—a cool Provence evening, the ruined cloister, the contrasting hi-tech platform construction and lighting system, and 4 full house anticipating an important performance; important both as an artistic event and as a political statement ‘The following description of the production's ‘pening scenes wil, I think, give the reader an idea of | the stylistic simplicity of the performance and perhaps some sense of the work's emotional power. Another trumpet fanfare announces the beginning of the play. Lights on the audience area dim abruptly as a blue wash comes up on the passageway behind the stage platform. ‘Two actors enter, one with a straight-backed chair and one with a mop and bucket ‘The first actor places the chair in the center of the platform and sts. The second begins to mop the stage. ‘The blue background lights dim and stage lights come up. For almost 90 seconds, the man in the chair, wearing a black suit and a fedora, sits staring toward the audience as the second man, who wears a grey suit and an apron, mops the floor expertly, glancing now and then atthe sitting man and atthe audience. ‘The mopper finally puts down his mop and addresses the audience, introducing Pereira in his chair 2 and himself, Manuel, a waiter in a café frequented by the journalist. Manuel, played by Thierry Gibault, removes a letter from his apron and hands it to Pereira, played by Daniel Delabesse. (In addition to their work with Théétre de Aquarium, both actors are familiar to French audiences from their work in films and television). Pereira rises and silently reads the letter as Manuel speaks to the audience with great energy, also continuing to mop the floor. He tells us that the letter was written by Pereira himself and then “sets the scene” of Pereira’s conflict and the tense political situation in Lisbon in the summer of 1938. Pereira soon resumes his postion inthe chair at center stage and requests a cigar and lemonade. ‘Manuel drops his mop, dashes stage right and opens a large concealed drawer in the stage platform below floor level. He removes a crate of lemons, a glass and spoon, a bag of sugar, a cigar and matches. He makes the lemonade, clips the cigar, gives both to Pereira and lights the cigar with @ match, Pereira smokes and drinks, then stares toward the audience, bemused, as Manuel tells us that we're going to witness Pereira's struggle to find his “raisons du coeur,” and his voice. ‘A foghiom moans and we hear the sound of birds. Both ‘men listen to the sounds as the lights dim. ‘When the lights rise after a moment, a woman enters from stage right, dressed in grey. Manuel looks at her and then exits. The woman, played by Lisa ‘Schuster, caries an empty picture frame which, indeed, frames her head and shoulders. She is “Le Portrait,” a Painting of Pereira’s deceased wife. She crosses to Pereira, hands him a pair of slippers, then speaks to the audience. She tells us that she understands what her ‘husband is going through and that she has faith in him, We hear soft piano music as the lights fade to blac. The blue lights behind the stage rise as the ‘woman exits and Manuel reappears. Pereira tries to explain his dilemma to Manuel, who is sympathetic but doesn’t really understand. Pereira becomes steadily ‘more upset, railing against the coming political storm, railing against the Catholic church for its lack of action, and railing against his own inability to find the courage to speak out against the Fascists. “This city stinks of death,” he says. “All Europe stinks of death.” But he feels impotent, unable to act. Ms, Schuster reenters. She's empty-handed and now wears an orange dress. She listens fora few ‘moments to Pereira’s diatribe before the men become aware of her. Manuel introduces her to Pereira. We hear café music with a Latin rhythm and steadily increasing tempo. Pereira and the woman begin to dance. Manuel explains to the audience that thewoman is Marta, a Jewish gil wh has a pat to play in Pereira’s struggle. As their dance continues, the lights fade to black ‘These introductory scenes exhilarated me. Here was the same riveting anti-spectacle 1 remembered in Thédtre de I’Aquarium’s work from twenty years ago. I was plunged into two worlds at conce—the world of Lisbon in 1938 and the world of the actors telling me the story—and my involvement ‘was compelled by the simplest of theatrical means: ‘minimal but evocative technical design and execution, ‘expert and unmannered performances, and the promise ‘of a good story unfolding. There was nothing “spectacular” happening, yet the effect was deeply satisfying esthetially and emotionally. “Throughout Act the audience was engrossed in the work (no coughing, rustling, ec.) as Gibaul, Delabesse and Schuster brilliantly communicated the characters’ emotional reality and the author's ultimate purpose: enabling us to see ourselves in Pereira's dilemma, warning us ofthe consequences of silence. ‘Tension builds steadily during Act 1 as Pereira fails again and again to find a way to break through his silence. The act ends on a quieter note of irony and ‘exhaustion. When the lights rise on the final scene, we hear sounds of waves and sea birds. Manuel enters wearing a Hawaiian print shirt and smoking a cigar. Pereira enters wearing a bathing suit. He asks for @ cigar and Manuel provides it. Perera asks for food and Manuel opens a concealed trap door in the stage, removes a working hotplate, skillet, salt, pepper, a plate stacked with small fish, two glasses and a bottle of champagne. He puts the fishin the skillet and they begin to sizzle. He pours the champagne and the two men drink. They stare at the audience. Manuel remarks upon Perera’s apparent “discomfiture.” “Belle expression,” replies Pereira with a tired shrug. They drink, and stare atthe audience. Blackout, end of Act 1 In Act II the pressure on Pereira also comes from outside himself. His employer, the young writer, political policeman and even Manuel (all played by Gibault, of course) make it clear that time is running ‘out. Marta and “Le Portrait” become less sympathetic to is plight and insist that he take the risk of speaking out. ‘The play's last two scenes depict Pereira’s final crisis and its resolution. The tension that has been ‘building in the now frantic Pereira and in the audience reaches a crescendo that is reinforced by a sudden ‘change in Monsieur Gibault’s acting style. Gibault ‘enters wearing a black suit and carrying a briefcase. 23 But this is no longer Manuel pretending to be someone else. The actor fully inhabits this new character ‘There isno sign ofthe light-hearted Manuel. The man is from the fascist political police and Pereira is frightened of him. As the policeman begins to interrogate Pereira, he takes a whit tablecloth from his briefease and unfolds it. A trap-door at center opens and a table rises through the opening. The policeman puts the tablecloth on the table and opens a drawer hidden inside th table. He removes two place-sttings and sets the table, all the while continuing his interrogation. ‘The combination of the Fascist’s mundane domestic actions and his threatening presence created a mesmerizing illustration of the “banality of evil” The audience was transfixed When Pereira does not answer to his satisfaction, the Fascist takes a revolver from the briefease and points it at Pereira, Pereira recoils in fear, then straightens, facing his interrogator. The Fascist pulls the trigger, which clicks on an empty ‘chamber. Laughing, the Fascist takes one black glove from the briefcase and pus it on. He takes a black sap from his pocket, makes a final, quiet threat, and slams the sap into the table, shattering the place settings. Blackout When the lights rise Pereira is sitting on a suitcase in the down right comer of the stage platform, manual typewriter on his lap. He types and tells us that he has found his voice. He takes the paper from the typewriter, reads it to himself, then signs it. With aclothespin, he fastens the paper to an almost invisible wire stretched across the stage. He puts on an overcoat, takes his passport from the coat pocket and wearily but resolutely explains that he is leaving the country. He Jooks at his letter, then atthe audience, and exis. ‘As Percira's recorded voice reads the anti- fascist statement he has published, the paper rises ‘magically into the air, higher and higher. The wire is affixed to the top-most ramparts on opposite sides of the cloister courtyard. A spotlight fixes the paper as it rises, uttering inthe wind. Blackout. ‘After six curtain calls for the actors, the audience calls for the director. Bezace takes a final, extended curtain call with the actors. The audience has been deeply affected by the play and their comments to ‘each other a they leave the cloister are illuminating “It is perfect representation of France today,” says one man. A woman says“, of course, fel exactly like Pereira.” “Bezace's best work,” says a third person. I shared their enthusiasm. The performance was a remarkable achievement both as an adaptation ofliterature and as an independent work of theatre. Bezace and the actors made no attempt to present a formal reproduction of Tabucchi's novel, ‘The actions of the play did not follow the book's chronological sequence of events, for example. The play “jumped around” in the book, creating its own intemal logic of events. Characters from the book were climinated in the play, of course, and except for Pereira, those characters who remained were presented theatrically. That is, the company, while remaining true to the meaning of the various characters, freely adapted the being of the characters to the nature of the Play, The ultimate goal of artists adapting literature for the stage, I believe, is to create a work that ‘communicates precisely the ideas and emotions of the literature ina work of theatre that exhibits an entirely independent esthetic. play adapted from a nove, in ‘other words, shouldbe abl to stand alone asa work of aut, borrowing nothing from the book except those lements necessary to communicate the author's ideas and the emotional context in which he or she embedded them. This Pereira Prétend accomplished bility. Thééitre de [’Aquarium’'s approach to literary adaptation originates with Didier Bezace but the actors clearly understand that approach and have mastered it They employ a calm, almost unobtrusive, yet obvious and organic Brechtian context in their performance style. “We are presenting a show,” they seem to say, “and you are not to forget that. Still, we want you to ‘believe’ the characters and understand the ideas and «motions that thei personalities and actions represent.” For example, the actor Thierry Gibault fist appears in Pereira Prétend playing the character Manuel, the waiter. Even in the first scene, however, Monsieur Gibault speaks tothe audience not only as Manuel but also as himself, an actor, describing elements of what the audience is secing and the historical context of the ‘enacted events. Shortly thereafter, Monsieur Gibaul, still playing Manuel, pretends to be a colleague of Percira’s—Gibault pretending to be Manuel pretending to be a third character. The ating approach, or style, with which this was accomplished resonated perfectly with the “an spectacle” of the over-all staging. Gibault made litle attempt to “change himself” from one pretended character to another. Infact, he sometimes told us that hhe would shortly be playing Manuel again (“Excuse te, I have to get back to the café") and that he, as Manuel, would shortly be playing Pereira’s colleague (Ob, Fean play him. know what to say." The actor did not alter the sound of his voice noticeably, nor his 4 ‘manner. With the exception of the Fascist policeman, hhe did not assume a noticeably new persona for the various characters he played. ‘The same is true for Madamoiselle Schuster. She moved and sounded like “herself” when pretending to be Marta and Le Portrait Obvious textual clues and minimal costume adjustments were enough to enable the audience to understand and accept the functional and emotional reality of the various characters. There was no elaborate set but rather naturally theatrical setting for the event—the cloister, courtyard in an ancient city, the night and the wind, the artistic expectations of the audience and the political relevance of the work. There was no spectacular stagecraft on display. The drawers in the stage platform, the trap-door, the working hotplate, the leter rising on a wire—all were minimal in their size, appearance and utility. The stagecraft effects, throughout the performance were no more than small, carefully chosen and matter-of-factly employed adornments to the whole. They were all clever, intelligent, organic to the action and most expertly constructed and employed. There was nothing sloppy, here. But there was also nothing to “get in the way” of the real business of the performance—to perfectly communicate the meaning of the characters and events in Tabucchi’s book, and to do so by creating an effective work of theatrical adaptation—physically, ‘emotionally and politically engaging—without drawing, ‘undue attention to itself and away from the material from which the work is adapted. ‘One every level, atleast by my measurement, Pereira Prétend represents a masterful example of both theatrical adaptation and theatre art. Excerpts from an Interview with Didier Bezace Didier Bezace began his career in 1964 as a performing ‘member of the collective Thédtre de I’Aquarium, He ‘became the principal director of the company in 1984, He is highly respected in France for his theatrical adaptations of literature and his direction of productions at the Cartoucherie and at the Avignon festiv WES: Didier, twenty years ago your company created what I have called “anti-spectacle,” a simplicity of staging that had a spectacular effect. Does Pereira Prétend represent the same artistic impulses as your earlier work? DB: It's a very long story. The work you aretalking about was the first part of the story of the ‘company. Ten years ago the company began to split up ‘and at the same time I began to try working with literature, The work now is not about the appearance of reality. Ihave tried to make a transition to literature and literary writers. Antonio Tabucchi, is he known? WES: Ihave seen his book, in French DB: —_ Well, this play is part of a cycle of three plays. ‘Two were in last year’s Festival and this isthe lat one. Brecht, Bove, a French author very unknown in France, and Tabucchi. I'll try to explain what we try to express inthis kind of work. In this eycle, we are working on states of consciousness, individual or collective states of consciousness which look at the history of Europe around the time of World War II, the rise of fascism in Europe. And we tell these stories in order to ‘experience the pleasure of discovering theatrical forms ‘through the authors on whose texts we work, and because we believe it’s a way to observe ourselves, and our own contemporary history in the context of the history of fifty years ago. Thédtre de I’Aquarium continues to develop, it has kept on its way since our wonderful experience in the United States (at the Baltimore festival). It has changed, but its nature has not changed. Its spirit and soul remain. 1 would say it hhas simply evolved because people themselves have grown. But it remains a company made up of craftspeople in the theatre who enjoy exploring reality ‘on the stage, That's what it is. WES: Your political passions are apparent in the work. DB: Yes? WES: Do your artistic passions coincide with your political passions? How does what we see tell me about your polities? DB: Well, enjoying politics and enjoying the arts are two things I find closely linked because, at the end of it all, politics is a way to explore our lives, which are well, which are both individual and collective destinies. I believe we do not reflect on politics in the same way we used to twenty years ago. Today, things ‘may be more connected to something existential, even psychological perhaps, that can be found in such works as Tabucchi’s and Bove's. Because even though there is some will o explain, to discuss politics, there is also ‘a will fo explore what takes place in the human spirit 25 and soul, I mean in the human being WES: The three actors in Pereira Prétend—have you worked with them before? DB: Yes, for three years now. The three actors worked with me in Le Pigge (The Trap), the play adapted from Emmanuel Bove's novel, and in the works of Brecht. We launched this project more than two years ago now. It will continue at last for another year, so it is... it's not a permanent company as we used to call it in France some years ago, but it’s a team, a loyal core team with whom I hope to be able 10 pursue an artiste journey. WES: When you adapted the Tabucchi book did you take entire sections of the text for the play or... ? DB: Oh, yes... the principle of our work is to choose a point of view about the novel and then to commit ourselves to revisiting, and to exploring the novel with three actors, two men and a woman, We started from the beginning of the novel, on stage, immediately on stage. We did not start by writing at the table but immediately on stage . .. We began to revisit o go across, to travel the entre novel. Then we started putting pieces together, then we undid them, put other pieces back together, inverted things ... that’s the way we worked WES: Your audience. When you create the work, do ‘you see the audience? Do you know who they will be? DB: Well, yes and no, I mean, yes, because 1 always think, possibly in a selfish manner somewhat, that the things I dream about are the same things that the audience is likely to think about, so it is never disconnected from our process. But it doesn't mean that we're concemed about whether what we do is better one way or the other forthe audience. We think ‘of the audience because we would like the play to win people over and appeal to them. But we aso think of the audience by demanding that people be curious, Patient, even sometimes show stamina such as atthe ‘Avignon Festival! When we are outdoors and there is alt of wind... lke this evening. The thought ofthe audience is always with us because we have no raison d’érre without an audience. So we think of them, but it doesn’t mean we want to coddle them. We think about the audience while being convinced, rightly or ‘wrongly, that they will follow us, go along with us ‘when we tell the stories we tel{At the Cartoucherie} there's a part of the audience that’s always the same. It sa loyal audience. ‘And then, when a play is particularly successful brings more and more people. So we have a loyal audience, people who like the type of work we do with novelists, specifically our slightly odd process of literally walking and traveling through literary texts. But some plays are lucky enough to generate a large audience. That's when I tend to think that we have ‘gone beyond a certain stage and that we're doing what ‘we callin French “repertory theatre.” It means a text or a play acquires some kind of value that transcends the ‘deep differences between audiences and begins to reach what we call the “general public.” This snot the case for some projects, such as this one which, I believe, are enjoyed by a certain type cof audience that, to my mind is the beautiful theatre audience, that wants to be touched, moved, captivated. This audience is capable of giving credit to what is happening on stage, to expect something it deserves, bbut not necessarily in an immediate exchange, for instantaneous gratification. Not only is this audience capable of waiting for things to come, they are also able to take things with intelligence, and curiosity, while having a capacity for "surprise and “displacement.” In other words, it's an audience that likes to be challenged into unfamiliar grounds. WES: This question: government government money ...? - French DB: Yeah, government is money. WES: Isit? Is the money enough? DB: _Itnever is enough, WES: _Isitless than before? Has the government cut subsidies? DB: In general, think it’s better now than twenty years ago. I think it’s better now, although our 6 situation today is more difficult. It seems like a paradox. There is more money but the conditions of theatre production, finding channels to show our work, and ways to reach audiences have become harder. So money has become more necessary than in the past. And in France we are going through a time of pervasive economic liberalism in all political ideologies, left and right. So much so that whatever is. hhanded back from the goverment for cultural production is somehow endangered. On the one hand, itis threatened by the economic crisis which gives the impression that culture is less important, while in fact. the opposite has happened. On the other hand, the ideas of economic liberalism have infiltrated political ‘ideology in the cultural arena I believe, on the left and the right ofthe French political spectrum, WES: Tonight the audience asked for six curtain calls. They asked for you. But afterwards, you seemed abit unhappy. Why? DB: I'm not unhappy. I’m a little sad this evening because itis our ast performance here in Avignon and because we are performing in a very beautiful outdoor location. The weather was unkind tonight because of the very strong wind we call the Mistral, and because 1 think people did not see tonight exactly the same visual effects we created. They saw a show that the ‘wind created—not quite the same thing. Itwas just one of those nights. However, I'm very glad that we came here, that we brought this project to completion, that ‘we introduced itt the public at least. And I am happy to have come to this stage in our work so the audience, a very beautiful audience—the Avignon Festival has a really wonderful audience—was able to endure for two and a half hours while feeling really cold. I'm happy about this team, happy about this work. It is not ‘completed yet but its existence is already confirmed through its rapport with the audience. ‘Trans, Anne GirardeauFestival and Fringe in Edinburgh Glenn Loney ‘The final three weeks of August in Edinburgh ‘out-Festival all the rest of Europe’s many festival cities. [Not only is there the official Edinburgh International Festival—celebrating its SOth anniversary this past summer—but there is the now almost equally famous Festival Fringe. The booking-office forthe Fringe is on the Royal Mile. This major avenue rises from Holyrood Palace up a steep hill tothe ancient Edinburgh Castle at the top, During the three weeks of the Festival and Fringe, the section of the Royal Mile flanking the Fringe Office is closed to traffic during the day so all manner of mimes, jugglers, stand-up comics, dancers, and the ubiquitous bag-pipers can flaunt their talent. Performers from various Fringe plays, musicals, and other shows also try to catch the attention of tourists, who are trying to decide what to see. The Fringe annually publishes an extensive performance schedule—this August on slick paper and running to 160 pages! But it also issues a large daily schedule listing everything available, including arts and crafts, installations, and gallery shows. Sir Rudolf Bing—who recently passed away—conceived the idea of a summer festival for Edinburgh. He was then managing the Glyndebourne Opera Festival in Southeast England. The opera productions were so attractive and the performers so talented that he wanted to share them with a much wider audience. The rest is history It should be obvious that the three festival weeks bring millions of pounds into the Edinburgh economy. Ticket sales are the least of it. The masses of performers, spectators, and tourists merely passing through have to eat, sleep, and shop. Recently, after centuries of boring, pious Sundays, Edinburgh has permitted stores to open on the Lord's Day. This has horrified some conservatives, but it fills the tills. ‘The Royal Opera’s Macbeth In the actual Edinburgh Festival, the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, gave the operatic version of ‘Macbeth something of a rest by producing it only halfway. In fact, most of the Festival's drama and opera productions distinguished by their often spartan simplicity. In some cases, the design minimalism was 2 clearly dictated by budgetary concems. However, several were obviously designed to tour with a ‘minimum of difficulty. Covent Garden scored on both ‘counts. The most penny-pinching of all major Festival productions was this Macbeth, It was originally planned as a full stage production, but the money ran out in London. Because the Royal Opera is curently closed fora long overdue renovation and modemization, funds have been even more restricted than usual. But Covent Garden needs to maintain its performance presence in ‘other venues during the closure. So it appeared atthe Festival with a concert production, withthe men in tails and the women in formal gowns. This would not seem ‘unusual, had the principals actually concertized. But, for some odd reason, they tried to act their roles inthe narrow space in front of the confining ters of chorus, also formally attired. It looked lke a colony of penguins singing in Italian, The clichés of operatic gesture have seldom looked more awkward. The emotions engendered in Verdi's music are powerful and clear, but stock trimaces and hand-wavings don't go well wit them. It is almost risible to watch a smiling singer vocalize about Macheth's great events and passions. Walking purposefully into the wings in evening dress also doesn't quite suggest Banquo’s death. Even in kilts, this Macbeth and Banquo would have seemed unreal Opera singers should be grateful for set, costume, and lighting designers who can somewhat disguise their thespian inadequacies. ‘Stéphane Braunschweig’s Measure for Measure Like his Canadian colleague, Robert Lepage, France’s Stéphane Braunschweig often makes his set the central machine of his productions. In fact, his frst ‘company was called Le Théétre-Machine. His Centre Dramatique National d'Orléans production of The Winter's Tale (shown 1994 in Edinburgh) was dominated by a strange mechanical contraption which ‘could be floor, wall, or incline. He retumed to the Festival this year with Shakespeare's Measure for Measure. This time, however, he was working in English withthe Nottingham Playhouse ensemble. ‘The tage-machine Braunschweig designed for‘Measure for Measure was more complicated than that forhis Winter’s Tale, but it artfully complemented the \heels-within-wheels/palace-to-gutter complexities of the plot. He created an outer semi-circular tall black wall on wheels, with two separate sets of semi-circular high black stairs, also on wheels, inside it At the core of this mysterious carousel was a blood-red platform All ofthese rolling elements were variously pushed and pulled on circular tracks by the players to move the action forward and suggest new locations in a mythical Vienna. Not even the costumes of Thibault ‘Vaneraenenbrock offered much relief from the mordant blackness. It remained for Marion Hewlett’s ingeniously selective lighting to illuminate the play in ‘more than the purely physical sense. ‘Measure for Measure is an intriguing, but baffling, drama. And very litle of itis comedic to ‘modem sensibilities. Even its “happy-ending” is deeply questionable. The disguised Duke of Vienna (Jim Hooper) has left his deputy, Angelo (Paul Brennan), free to use and abuse the ducal powers. So the seemingly virtuous Angelo moves to force the chaste novice-nun Isabella (Lisé Stevenson) to surrender her -virgiity to save her brother's life In the extremities of her fear, anger, and humiliation at this dangerous situation, the Duke only silently savors the moral dilemmas raised. And this curious prince covertly subjects her to further humiliations and griefs. Perhaps he is testing her moral strength? If so, she passes, and her reward is marriage with this devious duke who has permitted her to suffer so much anguish. ‘There are, of course, some fine theological Points involved here, but they mean little to modem audiences. Shakespeare merely uses them as devices forthe plot and as reference-points for character. He is much more interested in exposing the gap between appearances and realities, between attitudes and self- knowledge. Isabella—though she can sce through ‘Angelo’s “glassy essence”—cannot yet look honestly into herself. While the angels might possibly smile at such contrasts, many modems don’t find it so amusing. Braunschweig’ interesting staging of the action on various stair levels and in changing space conformations kept the plot in constant motion. But the interpretations he developed with his actor/characters did not unlock the secrets of ths play. If anything, the Duke seemed more needlessly cruel and morbidly interested in matters sexual than in other productions T've seen. Pethaps there is something to Lucio's suggestion—which the Duke furiously denies—that he is a duke of dark places? 28 Dividing India and Pakistan Using the most elemental of poles, carpets, boxes, bundles, and cloths, the Tamasha Theatre Company created intimate and powerful scenes of the tragedy of the partitioning of India and Pakistan Based on ensemble improvisations and short-stories about the wrenching experience, their production is, called A Tainted Dawn: Images of Partition. A crowded railway carriage, for instance, is suggested by a canvas between two poles and agitated Hindus and Muslims desperately clutching various bags and cases, swaying with the motion of the train, The ‘Muslims—soon to be Pakistanis—revel in their male “courage” when in friendly territory. When the train arrives in a Hindu area, the tables are turned. ‘The hopes, hatreds, fears, and beliefs that forced the Partition are illustrated at all levels of education and life. A group of university students—friends from families and villages of

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