Jean-François Sivadier

A new edition of Paroles d’acteurs is upon us once again, and with it a fresh encounter between a young generation of actors and an experienced director. This year it is Jean-François Sivadier’s turn to try his hand, and to communicate his art and practice to the actors of the “Talents Adami Cannes” project. He has turned to the myth of the Atrides, and the writings of different authors, Sophocles, Euripides and Aeschylus, in order provide the actors with a powerful, organic, and archaic language extending far beyond all everyday references. This is epic, political and poetic theatre in which the word itself is the source of action, and in which ideas take on a life and body of their own. The high stakes at work in these pieces offers the actors matter for performance which is of an inexhaustible nature. The so-called “theatre of the Atrides” confronts us with an array of different portraits and larger than life figures, carried along by a tide of events beyond their control. They are prisoners to their birth, to the crimes committed by their ancestors, shackled hand and foot to what they call their destiny, but which is none other than the manifestation of the will of the Gods. As human beings, they are entirely taken up with analyzing to what extent they are beholden to forces beyond their control, with coming to terms with the original sin, justifying their acts, reinventing their own legitimacy in the eyes of the nation, and with redefining their own identity in a world which, until further notice, remains a bloodthirsty one. The challenge for the director is to invent a common form of vocabulary which will enable the participants to measure up to, in the most generous way possible and with minimal means, these seemingly impossible stories. Jean-François Sivadier will guide them in their journey into a subject with no start nor finish, and will be ensuring that this four week-long adventure gives rise to an encounter of a true kind - at the end of which each can feel slightly less small than when they began.