the seagull - CDN Orléans Loiret Centre

THE SEAGULL
by Anton CHEKHOV
Direction
Arthur NAUZYCIEL
TOUR 2013/2014
T2G – Théâtre de Gennevilliers,
centre dramatique national de
création contemporaine
09/19 jan 2014
Équinoxe, Scène nationale de
Châteauroux
23/24 jan 2014
Le Préau Centre Dramatique Régional
de Basse-Normandie – Vire
30 jan 2014
TOUR 2012/2013
Centre Dramatique National
Orléans/Loiret/Centre
25/27 Sep 2012
PRODUCTION
CENTRE DRAMATIQUE NATIONAL
ORLÉANS/LOIRET/CENTRE
Direction Arthur Nauzyciel
Théâtre d’Orléans
Bd Pierre Ségelle, 45000 Orléans
Tel : + 33 (0) 2 38 62 15 55
Contacts:
Emmanuelle de Varax
06 61 17 03 51
[email protected]
Replace Anne Cuisset, secretary general,
in maternity leave
Sophie Mercier, administrator
[email protected]
Press: Nathalie Gasser
[email protected]
Creation in the Cour d’Honneur of the
Pope’s Palace, Avignon Festival 2012
Théâtre national de Bordeaux en
Aquitaine, CDN
2/5 Oct 2012
La Comédie de Clermont-Ferrand,
Scène nationale
10/12 Oct 2012
Le Parvis, Scène nationale Tarbes
Pyrénées
18/19 Oct 2012
le phénix, Scène nationale de
Valenciennes
7/8 March 2013
Le Préau Centre Dramatique Régional
de Basse-Normandie – Vire
14 March 2013
Comédie de Reims, CDN
21/22 March 2013
Théâtre de Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines,
Scène nationale
4/6 April 2013
Théâtre National de Nice, CDN
11/13 April 2013
CDDB-Théâtre de Lorient, CDN
17/18 April 2013
Maison des Arts de Créteil
24/27 April 2013
THE SEAGULL
By Anton CHEKHOV
Direction and adaptation
Arthur Nauzyciel
Choreography Damien Jalet
Set Riccardo Hernandez
Lighting Scott Zielinski
Sound Xavier Jacquot
Costumes José Lévy
Masks Erhard Stiefel
Music Winter Family and
Matt Elliott
Cast
Marie-Sophie Ferdane Nina
(of the Comédie-Française)
Xavier Gallais Tréplev
Vincent Garanger Dorn
Benoit Giros Shamrayev
Adèle Haenel Masha
Mounir Margoum Medvédenko
Laurent Poitrenaux Trigorin
Dominique Reymond Arkadina
Emmanuel Salinger Sorin
Catherine Vuillez Paulina
Translated from Russian by André
Markowicz and Françoise Morvan
(Actes Sud, 1996)
PRODUCTION
Production: Centre Dramatique
National Orléans/Loiret/Centre
Coproduction: Festival d’Avignon;
Région Centre; CDDB-Théâtre de
Lorient, CDN; Théâtre de Saint-Quentinen-Yvelines, Scène nationale; Maison
des Arts de Créteil; Le Parvis, Scène
nationale Tarbes-Pyrénées; Le Préau
Centre Dramatique Régional de BasseNormandie – Vire; le phénix, Scène
nationale de Valenciennes; MCB°
Bourges, Scène nationale; Théâtre
National de Norvège; France Télévisions.
With the support of Ville d’Orléans and
Institut Français.
The set has been built in the workshops
of the MCB° Bourges, Scène nationale.
With the participation of the atelier
Caraco Canezou for the costumes.
ABOUT THE SEAGULL
From A. F. Koni to Chekhov
November 6, 1896. (Excerpt)
From Chekhov to A. S. Suvorin, Melihovo
October 21, 1895. (Excerpt)
“Honoured Anton Pavlovich, maybe my
letter will surprise you, however even if
I am overworked, I can’t refuse myself
the desire of writing to you about your
Seagull which I finally saw. I have heard
(by Savina) that the reception of the
audience has given you much grief.
Please allow a member of the audience – a
profane, maybe in literature and dramatic
art, but who knows life by experience – to
say that he thanks you for the deep joy
your play gave him. The Seagull is a work
whose conception, freshness of ideas and
thoughtful observations of life situations
raise it out of the ordinary. It is life itself
on stage with all its tragic alliances,
eloquent thoughtlessness and silent
sufferings – the sort of everyday life that
is accessible to everyone and understood
in its cruel internal irony by almost no
one, the sort of life that is so accessible
and close to us that at times you forget
you’re in a theater and you feel capable of
participating in the conversation taking
place in front of you. And how good the
ending is! How true to life it is that not
she, the seagull, commits suicide (which
a run-of-the-mill playwright, out for his
audience’s tears, would be sure to have
done), but the young man who lives in an
abstract future and “has no idea” of the
why and wherefore of what goes on around
him. I also very much like the device of cutting off the play abruptly, leaving the
spectator to sketch in the dreary, listless,
indefinite future for himself. This is how
end, or to say it better, are revealed the
epic works. Yet maybe you will shrug your
shoulders . You could not care less about
my opinions and why do I write to you ?
Here is why : I love you for these minutes
of deep emotion you and your works gave
me and from afar and at random I want to
say a word of sympathy which maybe you
don’t need.
Your devoted. A. Koni.”
“Can you imagine it, I am writing a play
which I shall probably not finish before
the end of November. I am writing it not
without pleasure, though I swear fearfully
at the conventions of the stage. It’s a
comedy, there are three women’s parts, six
men’s, four acts, landscapes (a view over a
lake) ; a great deal of conversation about
literature, little action, tons of love.”
NOTE
“Flowers never die.
Heaven is whole.
But ahead of us we’ve only
somebody’s word.”
Ossip Mandelstam.
Over the empty earth.
To answer the question “Why put on
The Seagull?” amounts to answering the
question “Why or how to make theatre, for
me, today? What story can I tell after Jan
Karski?” In that – potentially surprising
– choice lies of course an answer to the
invitation to produce a play in the Cour
d’honneur of the Papal Palace. What kind
of discourse would I adopt, what kind of
voice would be heard, and what kind of
material would I rely on? The Seagull
touches on art, love, and the meaning of
our lives. A play about art, in other words
on the spiritual dimension of art and
its necessity in our lives, our wasted or
absurd lives that only beauty, dreams and
poetry may at times brighten. And hope.
It should suffice. It ends with the death
of a young man, an artist, and that is
precisely how we will begin the play.
In Art, as in life, there is neither beginning
nor end, the line is not horizontal, the
story not linear, it is a haze flecked with
gaps, images, stridencies and flashes.
The ending of the play IS the beginning
of our show. The play will be rebuilt on the
body of its lead character, an idealistic
artist and intractable dreamer, hurt and
appalled by the cruelty of the world and
beings around him, who has chosen to end
his life. Before the Papal Palace, a kind
of spectral Château de Laze, there will
be a ceremony, and a sad, graceful dance
will be performed to welcome him and go
through his life again, to relive the events
that have led him there, to the world of the
dead. Of course, it also corresponds to the
end of Ordet, and of Jan Karski: speaking
as a way to bring back the dead, with the
stage as a locus of reparation, conjuring
up the missing, for the fragile yet so
overwhelming consolation it may bring.
Chekhov’s writing repairs and saves.
The way he did as a doctor. After caring
for suffering bodies, closing the dead’s
eyes, the doctor he was chose writing and
nursing the souls, attempting to come to
terms with his own demons.
Rather than “illustrate” or “perform” The
Seagull, it is by journeying again across
the play, listening out for the words in
this place today – as in a memorial ritual,
that of the memory of a lost Seagull – ,
that it can still stir us. It is haunted by
other plays – Hamlet, The Oresteia. In a
venue of Faith, then of Theatre haunted
by theatre, and by the voices of those who
have preceded us.
For me, these texts, these classics, are
each time a memory of the future, in
the sense that they forever contain the
collective memory of a humanity to be. A
buried world, that of our aspirations and
disillusions: “In a month, in a year, how
will we suffer…”, Berenice says.
A highly symbolist but also epic play,
with a degree of brutality, it also tells the
story of a broken generation, of absent
fathers, of a world killing its artists and,
in them, any possible dream or elevation.
A world in which the Other is loved in
vain, alone, haunted by the issue of
existence. Medvédenko loves Macha who
loves Treplev who loves Nina who loves
Trigorin who is loved by Arkadina, while
Chemraiev loves Paulina who loves Dorn.
It spells disaster. “I have decided to tear
this love of mine out of my heart by the
roots”, Macha says.
Chekhov gives an uncompromising yet
empathetic description of the human
condition – we are the only living creatures
aware of death and the passing of time,
and we share a tremendous need for love
to withstand this awareness, that of being
hopelessly alone, in a position of solitude
that no kind of love will ever assuage.
The play was written at the time when film
and psychoanalysis were being invented,
and it reflects turn-of-the century changes
that, without being articulated, surround
characters hanging between longing
and anxiety, despair and hope, shortly
before the great wars. When Chekhov
wrote The Seagull, the whole world was
undergoing a transformation, a world was
being rebuilt on the ending of another.
Today we live among the ruins of the
previous century, in a post-catastrophe
world – that is to say, as Walter Benjamin
put it, at the origin: “The origin does
not describe the becoming of that which
emerges into existence, but rather that
which is in the process of emerging in
becoming and disappearance”. We are in
flux. Nina mentions the Horizon. But our
horizon has moved, we are resigned and
skeptical after the experiences of the past
century. Between utopia and memory,
looking ahead and back, in a horizon of
expectations toward which our actions
and thoughts are turned. The horizon
on the other side of the lake, a locus of
desire, of new, future opportunities, is no
longer there. Today the characters from
The Seagull have become that horizon of
expectations, they haunt the now driedout lake, as in Treplev’s play. In what
used to be a lake, in what might have been
a theatre, a lost humanity tries not to
forget. All they have left is words. Words,
once said, cannot make the space they
have opened up disappear.
“My youth and the feeling that will never
come back any more – the feeling that
I could last forever, outlast the sea, the
earth, and all men; the deceitful feeling
that lures us on to joys, to perils, to love,
to vain effort – to death; the triumphant
conviction of strength, the heat of life in
the handful of dust, the glow in the heart
that with every year grows dim, grows
cold, grows small, and expires – and
expires, too soon – before life itself.”
Joseph Conrad, Youth
Arthur Nauzyciel
March 2012
Anton Chekhov
Anton Chekhov was born in 1860, in
Taganrog, on the Sea of Azov, in a family
of small merchants. He was raised in
poverty and fearing a violent father.
Chekhov began medical studies at the
University of Moscow while providing for
the needs of his family. In 1880 he began
to write novellas under various pen names.
In 1884 he qualified as a physician. The
same year his first collection, TALES OF
MELPOMENE was published and the
second one MOTLEY STORIES in 1886.
Suffering from tuberculosis, he would
travel a lot during his life to find a milder
climate. He wrote PLATONOV at the age
of eighteen, a play unfinished, unpublished
and performed only after his death. It
will be his inspiration for IVANOV his
first published play in 1887, performed in
Moscow and Saint Petersburg. In spite of
the illness he travelled through Siberia to
the penal settlement of Sahalin in 1890.
Several writings would evoke the convicts
conditions of life. His short stories then
his plays made him very famous during
his lifetime.
THE SEAGULL was the first of his great
plays and confirmed his collaboration with
Stanislavski and Nemirovich Datchenko :
it was a fiasco when first created in St.
Petersburg but was a great success at
the Moscow Art Theatre in 1899. UNCLE
VANYA (1899), THE THREE SISTERS
(1900) and THE CHERRY ORCHARD
(1904) followed.
Anton Chekhov married the actress Olga
Knipper in 1901. He died of tuberculosis
during a cure at Badenweiler in Germany
in 1904.
Arthur Nauzyciel
After studying visual arts and cinema, Arthur
Nauzyciel trained as an actor in the school of
the Théâtre National de Chaillot (Paris) run
by Antoine Vitez (1978).
He began his career as an actor then turned
to stage directing. His first production as a
director was Le Malade imaginaire ou
le Silence de Molière, after Molière and
Giovanni Macchia for the théâtre de Lorient,
CDN (1999), followed by Samuel Beckett’s
Oh Les Beaux Jours (Happy Days) for
the Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe (2003) and the
Teatro San Martin in Buenos Aires (2004).
Since then there have been numerous
productions
in
France
and
abroad:
Thomas Bernhard’s Place des héros
(Heldenplatz) at the Comédie-Française
(2004), the entry of the Austrian author into
the repertoire of France’s national theater; Kaj
Munk’s Ordet (The Word) staged at the
Avignon Festival (2008) and at the Théâtre du
Rond-Point during the Paris Autumn Festival
(2009); Jan Karski (Mon nom est une
fiction)/Jan Karski (My Name is a
Fiction), adapted from the novel by Yannick
Haenel, staged at the Avignon Festival (2011).
Faim (Hunger), based on Knut Hamsun’s
novel, with Xavier Gallais at the Théâtre de
la Madeleine in Paris (2011); Anton Chekov’s
La Mouette (The Seagull) staged in
the Cour d’honneur of the Papal Palace at the
Avignon Festival (2012).
Arthur Nauzyciel works regularly in the
United States: in Atlanta he staged two plays
by the French playwright, Bernard-Marie
Koltès: Black Battles With Dogs
(Combat de nègre et de chiens) (2001),
also presented in Chicago, Athens (at the
International Festival), and in France at the
Avignon Festival (2006); and also in Atlanta,
B-M Koltès’s Roberto Zucco (2004); in
Boston, for the American Repertory Theater,
Mike Leigh’s Abigail’s Party (2007) and
William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar
(2008), which went on tour to the Paris
Autumn Festival and the Ibero-American
Theater Festival in Bogota, Colombia.
Arthur Nauzyciel has created a number of
shows abroad that were then revived in France
or at international theater festivals: Samuel
Beckett’s L’Image (The Image) in Dublin
(2006) with Damien Jalet and Anne Brochet,
later Lou Doillon, the production was also
staged in Reykjavik, New York, Paris, China,
Japan; Marie Darrieussecq’s LE Musée de
la mer (The Sea Museum), performed at
the National Theater of Iceland (2009); Mike
Leigh’s Abigail’s Party, revived for the
National Theater of Norway (2012).
He has also worked for dance and opera. In 2011
he staged the opera Red Waters by Keren
Ann Zeidel and Bardi Johannsson (Lady and
Bird) and contributed to the creation of Play
by the choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui
and the dancer Shantala Shivalingappa.
He regularly works with other artists on his
projects: Christian Fennesz, Miroslaw Balka,
Damien Jalet, Sjon, Erna Omarsdottir, Winter
Family.
Arthur Nauzyciel is a recipient of the Villa
Médicis Hors les Murs Prize.
His production Jan Karski (Mon nom est
une fiction) was awarded the GeorgesLerminier Prize.
Since June 1, 2007 he has been the director
of the Centre Dramatique National Orléans/
Loiret/Centre.
After
BLACK
BATTLES
WITH
DOGS in 2006, ORDET (THE WORD)
in 2008, JAN KARSKI (MY NAME IS
A FICTION) in 2011, Arthur Nauzyciel
is invited for the fourth time by the
Avignon Festival to present THE
SEAGULL in the Cour d’honneur of
the Popes’ Palace.
ARTISTIC TEAM
Damien Jalet
Riccardo Hernandez
Damien Jalet is French and Belgian.
He started his dance career with Wim
Vandekeybus on the show THE DAY OF
HEAVEN AND HELL in 1998. In 2000, he
began an intense collaboration with Sidi
Larbi Cherkaoui as his artistic partner
within the company Les Ballets C de la
B. They co-created RIEN DE RIEN (2000),
FOI (2003), TEMPUS FUGIT (2004),
and MYTH (2006). In 2002 he created
the piece D’AVANT in collaboration with
Cherkaoui, Luc Dunberry and Juan Kruz
Diaz de Garaio Esnaola. He is regularly
collaborating with Erna Ómarsdóttir
(OFAETT,
THE
UNCLEAR
AGE,
TRANSAQUANIA). They codirected for
the prestigious Melbourne Arts Festival
the piece BLACK MARROW for the
Australian dance company Chunky Move.
He created THREE SPELLS with dancer
Alexandra Gilbert and musician Christian
Fennesz in 2008. In 2010, he codirected the
piece BABEL (WORDS), a collaboration
with Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Antony
Gormley, which received two Laurence
Olivier Awards in 2011.
Damien Jalet and Arthur Nauzyciel
work together since 2006. They created
together THE IMAGE by Samuel Beckett
in 2006, he choreographied JULIUS
CAESAR by Shakespeare (2008), ORDET
(THE WORD) (2008), THE SEA MUSEUM
(LE MUSÉE DE LA MER) by Marie
Darrieussecq, created in 2009, in which he
also played the part of Bella, JAN KARSKI
(MY NAME IS A FICTION), in 2011. Their
latest cooperation was RED WATERS, an
opera by Lady & Bird (Keren Ann Zeidel
and Bardi Johannsson).
For Arthur Nauzyciel, he created the sets
of:
JULIUS CAESAR
JAN KARSKI (MY NAME IS A FICTION)
RED WATERS
ABIGAIL’S PARTY
THE SEAGULL
Born in Cuba and raised in Buenos Aires,
he studied in the United States, at the
Yale School of Drama. He works regularly
on Broadway, where he won many awards
for productions such as: THE PEOPLE
IN THE PICTURE (at legendary Studio
54), CAROLINE OR CHANGE, PARADE
(Tony Awards nominee and Drama Desk),
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG, et lately PORGY
AND BESS (Tony Awards 2012).
For the opera, he created amongst
others the sets of APPOMATTOX by
Philip Glass in 2007, LOST HIGHWAY
direction Diane Paulus, based on David
Lynch’s film, presented at the Young Vic,
London (2008), and those of IL POSTINO,
composed by Daniel Catàn and directed
by Ron Daniels, created at Los Angeles
Opera and presented at Châtelet-Théâtre
musical of Paris in 2011.
Productions in which he participated were
played in major theaters in New York and
the United States : New York Shakespeare
Festival/Public Theater, Lincoln Center,
BAM, Goodman Theater, Kennedy Center,
Mark Taper Forum...
For the theater, he has worked with
directors George C. Wolfe, Brian Kulik,
Mary Zimmerman, Ron Daniels, Liz
Diamond, Peter Wood and especially
Robert Woodruff, Ethan Coen, John
Turturro. More recently, he designed the
set of MARIE ANTOINETTE by David
Adjmi, directed by Rebecca Taichman
in autumn 2012 at the ART (American
Repertory Theater).
Scott Zielinski
Xavier Jacquot
For Arthur Nauzyciel, he created the
lighting design of:
JULIUS CAESAR
THE SEA MUSEUM
JAN KARSKI (MY NAME IS A FICTION)
RED WATERS
ABIGAIL’S PARTY
THE SEAGULL
For Arthur Nauzyciel he designed the
sound of:
THE IMAGINARY INVALID OR THE
SILENCE OF MOLIÈRE
BLACK BATTLES WITH DOGS
HAPPY DAYS
ORDET (THE WORD)
JAN KARSKI (MY NAME IS A FICTION)
Scott Zielinski lives in New York. For
theater, dance and opera, he has worked
on projects created throughout the world,
with American or foreign directors,
including Richard Foreman, Robert
Wilson, Tony Kushner, Hal Hartley,
Krystian Lupa.
Sound designer, he studied at the Théâtre
National in Strasburg. He has worked
regularly with Eric Vigner, Thierry
Collet, Daniel Mesguich, Xavier Maurel,
Stéphane Braunschweig and on short
features for the screen as well as on films
and documentaries for television. He has
chaired the “sound and video” department
of the school of the Théâtre national in
Strasburg from 2005 to 2008.
In New York, he works regularly on
Broadway, for the production of Topdog /
UNDERDOG by Suzan-Lori Parks, and for
Lincoln Center and The Public Theatre.
It also creates the lights for productions
in many other North American cities,
with direc tors and choreographers such
as Neil Bartlett, Chase Brock, Chen ShiZheng, Karin Coonrod, Ron Daniels, David
Esbjornson, Daniel Fish, Sir Peter Hall,
Tina Landau, Jonathan Moscone, Diane
Paulus, Lisa Peterson, James Robinson,
Anna Deavere Smith, Twyla Tharp,
George C. Wolfe, Mary Zimmerman and
recently, for MISS FORTUNE by Judith
Weir at the Royal Opera in London.
Scott Zielinski holds a Master in «Theatre
Design» at the Yale University School of
Drama.
José Lévy
Erhard Stiefel
The design of the costumes of ORDET
(THE WORD) directed by Arthur
Nauzyciel was his first collaboration for a
theatre project, then came JAN KARSKI
(MY NAME IS A FICTION), in 2011.
Erhard Stiefel was born in Zurich in 1940
where he studied drawing and painting
at the university of the Arts. Later on he
joined the Paris school of fine arts then
the Jacques Lecoq school and turned to
sculpture.
Fascinated by the stage and the carnival,
he began creating masks. Consequently
he visited often Bali and above all Japan
where he still has deep relations with
Nô and Kyogen families for which he
recreates ancient and fragile masks. In
1997, the year of Japan, he conceived an
event for the Festival d’Automne and
invited one of the greatest Nô masters,
Kiyokazu Kanze.
In 1997 Ariane Mnouchkine asked him
to work on A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S
DREAM and THE GOLDEN AGE, it was
the beginning of a collaboration with the
Théâtre du soleil that continues to date.
He has made masks for numerous directors
and choreographers such as Maurice
Béjart, Antoine Vitez, Philippe Avron,
Yves Hunstad, Jean-Pierre Vincent,
Jean-Louis Thamin, Christian Schiaretti,
Charles Tordjman, Alfredo Arias, Zingaro,
Eric Vigner and Tim Robbins.
In 2000 he was appointed “Master of Art”
as mask maker by the French Minister of
Culture.
A polymorphous artist and free electron.
Alternately designer, fashion designer,
artistic director, interior designer and
artist, José Lévy had excelled in all areas
of the fashion world before expressing
himself in the Fine Arts. Known for his
brand of ready-to-wear clothing José Lévy
in Paris, which made him famous from the
USA to Japan. He was artistic director of
Emanuel Ungaro and Holland and Holland,
and more recently he has designed for the
Manufacture de Sèvres, the gallery Tools,
Emmanuel Perrotin, Astier de Villatte,
Roche Bobois and Gallery B. Bensimon.
He is a scholar of the Villa Kujoyama and
Grand Prize of the City of Paris.
Winter Family
Matt Elliott
Winter Family is a duo from Jerusalem
and Paris. Ruth Rosenthal & Xavier
Klaine met in Jaffa in 2004 and live and
work together since. Xavier develops
layers of folk drones with his philicorda,
harmoniums, pipe organs, celesta and
a piano, while Ruth Rosenthal chants
her poems and plays the drums into
a mystic universe filled with political
sadness and dark romanticism. They
have been recording and playing live
in clubs, theaters & churches around
Europe and Israel. and worked with
many
choreographers,filmmakers,
photographers and visual artists. Their
debut album was out in 2007 at Sub Rosa
and was followed by a LP version in 2008
at Marienbad. It was well received by
critics. Winter Family currently resides in
Crown Heights, the Haitian neighborhood
of Brooklyn. They record their third salsa
album and complete the english version of
JERUSALEM CAST LEAD a documentary
theater performance (the French version
was performed for the first time at the 104
in Paris in June 2011 and won the Jury
Prize of Impatience Festival).
RED SUGAR, their new album was
released in Summer 2011.
Matt Elliott is an English guitarist and
singer from Bristol, England who plays
dark folk music He also produced and
recorded electronic music under the name
The Third Eye Foundation.
Elliott started recording with the band
Linda’s Strange Vacation, which included
Kate Wright and Rachel Brook, around
the time Wright and Brook formed
Movietone, and Brook and Dave Pearce
formed Flying Saucer Attack. Elliott was
a part time member of both bands.
He recorded SEMTEX, his first album
under the name The Third Eye Foundation,
and released it on his own record label,
Linda’s Strange Vacation, with the help
of the fledgling Domino Records.
As Third Eye Foundation, Elliott worked
with bands including Hood, Yann Tiersen,
Mogwai, Ulver, Tarwater, The Pastels,
Navigator, Urchin, Suncoil Sect, Remote
Viewer, Thurston Moore, primarily as a
remixer . In 2001 a compilation album of
his remixes was released.
In 2003 he released his first album under
his own name, THE MESS WE MADE
which marked a stylistic shift from the
Third Eye Foundation releases. The next
three albums were released as a trilogy
on the French label, ‘Ici, d’ailleurs... By
the release of DRINKING SONGS (2004),
his sound had changed considerably from
his earlier work, now being compared to
Tindersticks and Black Heart Procession.
On Yann Tiersen’s 2009 tour, Elliott was
support act, and later in the show was
part of Yann’s band onstage.
His lastest albums are HOWLING
SONGS, FAILED SONGS, THE DARK
and THE BROKEN MAN.
CAST
Dominique Reymond
Arkadina
Dominique Reymond studied drama in
Geneva before entering the Conservatoire
national supérieur d’art dramatique in
Paris.
On stage, she appeared in THE SEAGULL,
Claudel’s L’ÉCHANGE, and TARTUFFE
directed by Antoine Vitez, Claudel’s LA
VILLE , Ostroswski’s LA FORÊT directed
by Bernard Sobel, Yasmina Reza’s A
SPANISH PLAY, Ionesco’s THE CHAIRS
directed by Luc Bondy and Tennessee
Williams’ THE NIGHT OF THE IGUANA
directed by Georges Lavaudant. At the
2008 Avignon festival, she was part of
FEUX by August Stramm, directed by
Daniel Jeanneteau and Marie-Christine
Soma.
On TV she appeared in UN PIQUE-NIQUE
CHEZ OSIRIS, MARIE BONAPARTE) and
film work include: Y AURA T-IL DE LA
NEIGE À NOËL ? by Sandrine Veysset,
LES DESTINÉES SENTIMENTALES by
Olivier Assayas, LA MALADIE DE SACHS
by Michel Deville and ADIEU GARY by
Nassim Amaouche.
She just completed LES ADIEUX À LA
REINE by Benoît Jacquot.
Marie-Sophie Ferdane
(of the Comédie-Française)
Nina
She studied violin at the music
conservatory in Grenoble and graduated
from the drama school ENSATT in Lyon.
She began her theatre career with directors
Richard Brunel and Claudia Stavisky,
before meeting Christian Schiaretti for
THE THREEPENNY OPERA by Brecht
(2004); Paul Desveaux, THE STORM by
Ostrovski (2005); Jean-Louis Martinelli,
Bérénice by Racine (2006). In March
2012 she played in Macbeth by
Shakespeare, directed by Laurent Pelly.
She is a member of the prestigious
Comédie-Française since 2007 and played
under the direction of Lukas Hemleb,
THE MISANTHROPE by Molière; JeanLouis Hourdin, Pensées by Jacques
Copeau; Irène Bonnaud, Fanny by
Marcel Pagnol; Pierre Pradinas, THE
FORCED MARRIAGE by Molière; Muriel
Mayette, THE dispute by Marivaux;
Catherine Hiegel, THE MISER by Molière;
Anne Kessler, Les Naufragés by
Guy Zilberstein; Dan Jemmett, Grand
MagiC by Eduardo De Filippo; Philippe
Meyer, Chansons des jours avec
et chansons des jours sans;
Fausto Paravidino, La maladie de
la famille m.; Laurent Pelly, THE
THREEPENNY OPERa by Brecht;
Emmanuel Daumas, SUMMER RAIN
by Marguerite Duras; Isabel Osthues, A
RESPECTABLE WEDDING by Bertolt
Brecht. Between 2000 and 2006, she
directed four plays written by young
author Sarah Fourage.
On TV, she was part of Engrenages
directed by Pascal Chaumeil for Canal +
and IN SEARCH OF LOST TIME by Nina
Companeez.
On screen, she worked with Benoît Cohen
in LES Acteurs anonymes and with
Jean Becker in Bienvenue parmi
nous.
Catherine Vuillez
Paulina
Adèle Haenel
Masha
She studied at the Florent Acting School
before entering the Conservatoire National
Supérieur d’Art Dramatique. She worked
in classical repertory and contemporary
plays with famous directors such as JeanPierre Vincent (THE MARRIAGE OF
FIGARO), Roger Planchon, (Feydeau,
Musset, Calaferte) Klaus Michael Grüber
(DANTON’S DEATH) ; Eric Vigner (THE
BONE HOUSE by Roland Dubillard, THE
YOUNG MAN by Jean Audureau). Within
the Avignon Festival 2009, she played with
Nicolas Bouchaud DIS-MOI QUELQUE
CHOSE (Sujets à vif/SACD). In 2010 she
was alone on stage in L’ÉVÉNEMENT
after the novel by Annie Ernaux directed
by Jean-Michel Rivinoff followed by UNE
BELLE JOURNÉE by Noëlle Renaude
directed by Thomas Gaubiac and in 2011
THE IDEA OF NORTH after Glenn Gould
staged by Benoit Giros.
With Arthur Nauzyciel, she played in
THE IMAGINARY INVALID OR THE
SILENCE OF MOLIÈRE and ORDET by
Kaj Munk at the Avignon Festival 2008.
Born in Paris in 1989 from a French
mother and an Austrian father who is a
translator. She took drama class and at 13
got the first part in the film THE DEVILS
by Christophe Ruggia with Vincent
Rottiers.
In 2007 she was remarkable in Céline
Sciamma’s first film, NAISSANCE DES
PIEUVRES (OCTOPUS BIRTH) for which
she was nominated at the 2008 Césars.
After studies in sociology and economics,
she is back on the screen in 2010 and
2011 with L’APOLLONIDE (MEMORIES
FROM A BROTHEL) by Bertrand Bonello,
EN VILLE by Valérie Mréjen et Bertrand
Schefer, ALYAH by Elie Wajeman, and
TROIS MONDES by Catherine Corsini,
two films presented at the 2012 Cannes
Festival.
Laurent Poitrenaux
Trigorin
Xavier Gallais
Tréplev
He arrived in Paris at the age of eighteen
and entered Theâtre en Actes, Lucien
Marchal’s theatre school. Besides several
participations in films like TOUT VA
BIEN ON S’EN VA by Claude Mouriéras
and D’AMOUR ET D’EAU FRAÎCHE by
Isabelle Czajka, his career is mainly on
stage. He worked under the direction
of Christian Schiaretti as a member of
the troupe of the Comédie de Reims (LE
LABOUREUR DE BOHÊME by Johannes
von Saaz), Thierry Bedard (L’AFRIQUE
FANTÔME by Michel Leiris), Daniel
Jeanneteau (IPHIGÉNIE EN AULIDE by
Racine) and Yves Beaunesne (UNCLE
VANYA by Chekhov and ‘TIS PITY SHE’S
A WHORE) by John Ford). A regular
actor of stagings by Ludovic Lagarde, he
played in almost each of his productions:
TROIS DRAMATICULES by Samuel
Beckett, L’HYMNE by Gyorgy Schwajda,
THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE by
Bertolt Brecht, FAUST OU LA FÊTE
ÉLECTRIQUE and OUI DIT LE TRÈS
JEUNE HOMME by Gertrude Stein,
RICHARD III by Peter Verhelst and THE
BÜCHNER TRILOGY. He created texts
by Olivier Cadiot: SŒURS ET FRÈRES,
LE COLONEL DES ZOUAVES, RETOUR
DÉFINITIF ET DURABLE DE L’ÊTRE
AIMÉ, FAIRY QUEEN, UN NID POUR
QUOI FAIRE, UN MAGE EN ÉTÉ, all
directed by Ludovic Lagarde. Together
with François Berreur he created
ÉBAUCHE D’UN PORTRAIT, based on the
diary of Jean-Luc Lagarce, for which he
received the Critic’s Prize for Best Actor
of the Year 2008. With JAN KARSKI (MY
NAME IS A FICTION), Laurent Poitrenaux
worked again with director Arthur
Nauzyciel: they performed together in
BRANCUSI V. UNITED STATES directed
by Éric Vigner and created at the Festival
d’Avignon in 1996 and played the title
role of Arthur Nauzyciel’s first production
THE IMAGINARY INVALID OR THE
SILENCE OF MOLIÈRE based on Molière
and Giovanni Macchia, in 1999.
He is in Christian Vincent next film LES
SAVEURS DU PALAIS.
After studying at the Conservatoire
National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique, he
worked with Michel Fau, NONO by Sacha
Guitry; Benoit Lavigne, ADULTÈRES
by Woody Allen and BABY DOLL by
Tennessee Williams; Jean-Luc Revol,
TARTUFFE by Molière; Daniel Mesguich,
LE PRINCE DE HOMBOURG by Heinrich
von Kleist, DU CRISTAL À LA FUMÉE by
Jacques Attali; Jacques Weber, CYRANO
DE BERGERAC by Edmond Rostand,
ONDINE by Jean Giraudoux and RUY
BLAS by Victor Hugo; Philippe Calvario,
ROBERTO ZUCCO by Bernard-Marie
Koltès; Gilbert Desveaux, LES GRECS
by Jean-Marie Besset; Claude Bacqué,
SEPTEMBRE BLANC by Neil LaBute;
Olivier Py, Prométhée Enchaîné by
Eschyle
He directed SLEEPLESS NIGHTS by
Fedor Dostoievski.
On the screen, he appeared in DEUX
JOURS À TUER and Bienvenue parmi
nous by Jean Becker, MUSÉE HAUT,
MUSÉE BAS by Jean-Michel Ribes,
REQUIEM POUR UNE TUEUSE by
Jérôme Le Gris.
He has already worked with Arthur
Nauzyciel in ORDET (THE WORD)
created at the 2008 Avignon festival and
in HUNGER by Knut Hamsun presented
in Paris at the théâtre de la Madeleine in
December 2011.
Emmanuel Salinger
Sorin
Vincent Garanger
Dorn
Attended the film school IDHEC and the
drama school directed by Tania Balachova.
He began his career with the short film DISMOI OUI, DIS-MOI NON (1989) by Noémie
Lvovsky and Arnaud Desplechin films, LA
VIE DES MORTS, LA SENTINELLE (he
co-wrote the screenplay and received the
César for best newcomer in 1993).
He directed his first film in 2008, LA
GRANDE VIE, with Michel Boujenah and
Laurent Capelluto.
He has been a favorite of the French
“authors” cinema and appeared in LA
REINE MARGOT by Patrice Chéreau,
LES CENTS ET UNE NUITS DE SIMON
CINEMA by Agnès Varda, COMMENT
JE ME SUIS DISPUTÉ... (MA VIE
SEXUELLE) by Arnaud Desplechin.
He also worked with Maria de Medeiros,
CAPITAINES D’AVRIL, Éric Rohmer,
TRIPLE AGENT, Emmanuel Finkiel,
NULLE PART, TERRE PROMISE.
Recently he was seen in, LE SENTIMENT
DE LA CHAIR (2010) by Roberto Garzelli,
LA GUERRE EST DÉCLARÉE by Valérie
Donzelli (2011) and soon in AU CAS OÙ
JE N’AURAIS PAS LA PALME D’OR by
Renaud Cohen.
On stage, he played in FÉLICITÉ by
Jean Audureau and ANTONY AND
CLEOPATRA by Shakespeare, staged by
Pascal Rambert; LA SERVANTE (Histoire
sans fin), written and staged by Olivier
Py; SUMMER RAIN by Marguerite Duras,
staged by Guy Faucon; TERMINUS
by Daniel Keene, staged by Laurent
Laffargue and ALGER-ALGER after
LA GUERRE DES GUSSES by Georges
Mattéi, staged by Gérard S. Cherqui.
He graduated from the Conservatoire
National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique
de Paris where his teachers were Michel
Bouquet, Gérard Desarthe, and Mario
Gonzalès.
On stage he worked with Jean-Claude
Drouot, HIPPOLYTE OU LE GRAND PRIX
DE PARIS by Joseph Delteil, KEAN by JeanPaul Sartre, CYRANO DE BERGERAC by
Edmond Rostand; Marguerite Duras for
the creation of AGATHA; Alain Françon,
THE WAR PLAYS and COFFEE by
Edward Bond; Christophe Perton, LEAR
by Edward Bond, NOTES DE CUISINE
by Rodrigo Garcia, WOYZECK by Georg
Büchner, LE BELVÉDÈRE by Ödön
von Horváth; Philippe Delaigue, THE
LIFE OF GALILEO by Bertolt Brecht,
JUSTE LA FIN DU MONDE by Jean-Luc
Lagarce, SAGA DES HABITANTS DU
VAL DE MOLDAVIE by Marion Aubert,
DÉSERTION by Pauline Sales.
He was a permanent member of the CDN
of Valence during six years.
Since January 2009, he is codirector
with Pauline Sales of the Préau, Centre
dramatique régional de Basse-Normandie
in Vire. He also plays in the CDR
productions: À L’OMBRE by Pauline
Sales, directed by Philippe Delaigue;
J’AI LA FEMME DANS LE SANG after
Georges Feydeau, directed by Richard
Brunel; TAKING CARE OF BABY by
Dennis Kelly, directed by Olivier Werner.
With Caroline Gonce and Guy Pierre
Couleau, he directed BLUFF by Enzo
Cormann (2011).
Mounir Margoum
Medvédenko
Benoit Giros
Shamrayev
He studied at the Conservatoire National
Supérieur d’art dramatique with Denis
Podalydès, Daniel Mesguich and Joël
Jouanneau. On stage he regularly
works with Jean-Louis Martinelli UNE
VIRÉE, LES FIANCÉS DE LOCHES
and BÉRÉNICE, Lukas Hemleb TITUS
ANDRONICUS, Mathieu Bauer ALTA
VILLA, Laurent Fréchuret À PORTÉE DE
CRACHAT by Taher Najib or with young
stage directors such as Frédéric Sonntag,
Eva Doumbia or Thomas Quillardet...
On screen he was seen in RENDITION by
Gavin Hood, and HOUSE OF SADDAM,
produced by the BBC and HBO and in
French productions directed by Alain
Tasma, Simon Moutaïrou, Yasmina
Yahiaoui, Houda Benyamina. In 2010, he
directed two short films, HOLLYWOOD
INCH’ALLAH and ROMEO AND JULIET.
He worked with such directors as Eric
Vigner, Jacques Nichet, Bernard Sobel.
During five years he was part of a street
theatre company ECLAT IMMÉDIAT
ET DURABLE. He has been cast in films
directed by Jean-Luc Perréard, Jean-Louis
Bertucelli and by Rachid Bouchareb in
INDIGÈNES. He was awarded the critics’
prize for best actor at the Angers Festival
for QUAND TU DESCENDRAS DU CIEL
by Eric Guirado. He worked again with
Guirado in LE FILS DE L’EPICIER in
2007 et POSSESSIONS in 2012.
In 2009, he created his first staging
L’IDÉE DU NORD (THE IDEA OF NORTH)
by Glenn Gould while he was associate
artist at the Centre Dramatique National
Orléans/Loiret/Centre.
He was a Villa Medicis Hors-les-Murs
scholar in 2008.
His next creation inspired by Jean Renoir
THE RULES OF THE GAME will be
shown at the Orléans CDN next year.
He has already worked with Arthur
Nauzyciel in ORDET (THE WORD) by
Kaj Munk created at the 2008 Avignon
Festival.