The Lewis Center for the Arts, the Department of French and Italian, and L’Avant-Scène are set to present Princeton University’s third Seuls en Scène – French Theater Festival.
The festival is set to take place Sept. 15 through Oct. 11 at venues across the university’s campus. All performances will be in French and are free and open to the public.
Seuls en Scène brings French actors and directors to the university and the local community.This year’s festival includes a hit from the 2013 Avignon Theater Festival, a preview of a new monologue to premiere in France in November, and rarely staged texts by Knut Hamsun, Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac, and Louis Jouvet. Discussions with the artistic teams will follow a number of the performances.
Marking the launch of the 14th season of the student French theater workshop L’Avant-Scène, the festival has been organized by the workshop’s director, Florent Masse, a senior lecturer in Princeton’s Department of French and Italian.
Nicolas Bouchaud and Judith Henry are set to perform Projet Luciole (Project Firefly), a highlight of the 2013 Avignon Theater Festival on Sept. 17 and 18. Projet Luciole is created and directed by Nicolas Truong, a journalist and editor at Le Monde with a particular interest in the relationship between theater and ideas. Featuring texts by such writers as Theodor W. Adorno, Giorgio Agamben, Alain Badiou, Walter Benjamin, Guy Debord, Gilles Deleuze, George Orwell, Jacques Rancière, and Jaime Semprun, Projet Luciole explores a philosophical theater that emphasizes the energy and vivacity of critical thought that seeks to help us comprehend and live in the modern world.
The festival is set to open on Sept. 15 with a conversation between Truong and Masse on the development of Projet Luciole and Truong’s longtime contribution as a director and moderator of the intellectual debates at the Avignon Theater Festival. The conversation will be in French.
Arthur Nauzyciel, the Artistic Director of the National Theater Center of Orléans, and a leading French director is set to direct Faim (Hunger) by Knut Hamsun Oct. 1 and 2. Known for his cross-disciplinary approach and transnational collaborations, Nauzyciel’s productions have toured the world. He has been a frequent director at the French Institute Alliance Française “Crossing the Line Festival” in New York.
Nauzyciel will return to the tri-state area with Faim, an adaptation for the stage of the 1890 novel by Norwegian author and Nobel Prize recipient Knut Hamsun. At the intersection of reading and performance, the monologue Faim is in part an autobiographical tale of the terrifying descent of a man who wanders the streets – not unlike the anonymous faces who populate today’s cities. Xavier Gallais makes his Princeton debut portraying this outcast of society. This production will be accompanied by English subtitles.
Benjamin Lazar represents a new generation of directors whose unique aesthetics have begun to receive critical recognition. Lazaris set to direct and perform L’Autre Monde ou les États et Empires de la Lune (The Other World or the States and Empires of the Moon) Oct. 4 and 5. Lazar created the stage adaptation of this rarely performed story by Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac in which a man strives to go to the moon, convinced that it is a world comparable to our own. Musicians Florence Bolton and Benjamin Perrot, co-founders of the baroque music ensemble La Rêveuse, will accompany Lazar on stage.
The Compagnie des Petits-Champs, whose production L’Épreuve by Marivaux was part of Seuls en Scène 2013, is set to return to Princeton to present Le Voyage en Uruguay (The Trip to Uruguay) by Clément Hervieu-Léger Oct. 9 and 10. The company is also slated to present Répertoires: A Staged Reading based on the Drama Classes of Louis Jouvet at the Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique Oct. 11 .
In Le Voyage en Uruguay, Hervieu-Léger, a member of the Comédie-Française, revisits the story of an ancestor who brought Norman cattle from across the sea in order to establish a livelihood in a new country. Actor and director Daniel San Pedro, who co-founded the Compagnie des Petits-Champs with Hervieu-Léger, is set to direct. Guillaume Ravoire, a recent graduate of the Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique, will perform this newly written monologue, which will premiere in Princeton before opening in November in France.
Compagnie des Petits-Champs’ week-long residency will conclude with a staged reading featuring the company’s actors and directors. Comédie-Française member Loïc Corbery, will return to Princeton alongside Audrey Bonnet, who won the Best Actress Award in 2013 at les Palmarès du Théâtre, the French equivalent of the Tony Awards. Répertoires will highlight excerpts from classes by Louis Jouvet, a renowned director, actor and master teacher at the Conservatoire and one of the premiere artists of the French theater in the years before the Second World War. A selection of classical scenes by Racine, Molière and Beaumarchais will complement Jouvet’s texts.
Admission to all events is free but reservations are recommended by sending an email to ftw@princeton.edu with the subject line: “Festival.”
The full Seuls en Scène scheduled follows:
Sept. 15, 4:30 p.m.: Rencontre autour de Projet Luciole Nicolas Truong in Conversation with Florent Masse, in French. in East Pyne Hall Room 010.
Sept. 17 and 18, 8 p.m.: Projet Luciole, in French. Marie and Edward Matthews ‘53 Acting Studio at 185 Nassau Street.
Oct. 1 and 2, 8 p.m.: Faim, in French with English subtitles. Marie and Edward Matthews ‘53 Acting Studio.
Oct. 4, 8 p.m. and Oct. 5, 5 p.m.: L’Autre Monde ou les États et Empires de la Lune by Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac, in French. Marie and Edward Matthews ‘53 Acting Studio.
Oct. 9 and 10, 8 p.m.: Le Voyage en Uruguay by Clément Hervieu-Léger de la Comédie-Francaise. Class of 1970 Theater at Whitman College.
Oct. 11,6 p.m. and 9 p.m.: Répertoires. Class of 1970 Theater at Whitman College (residence hall)
More information is online at princeton.edu/~ftw.
Benjamin Lazar in Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac’s ‘L’Autre Monde ou les États et Empires de la Lune,’ one of the productions to be presented as part of Seuls en Scène – Princeton French Theater Festival. (Photo by Nathaniel Baruch.),
