Emilie Rousset Louise Hémon
Rituel 4 : Le Grand Débat
Devised and directed by Émilie Rousset and Louise Hémon
With Emmanuelle Lafon and Laurent Poitrenaux and the voice of Leïla Kaddour-Boudadi
Visual and lighting design, Marine Atlan
Cameras, Marine Atlan and Mathieu Gaudet
Scenography, Émilie Rousset and Louise Hémon
Editing, Carole Borne
Scenography, Émilie Rousset and Louise Hémon
Music, Emile Sornin
Make-up, Camille Marquette
Sound,video, Romain Vuillet
Stage management, light, Jérémie Sanames
Administration - Production, Bureau Produire
A John Corporation production in association with Agathe Berman Studio
With support from Fondation d’entreprise Hermès as part of its New Settings programme
A coproduction with Festival d’Automne à Paris
In association with Théâtre de la Cité internationale (Paris) ; and Festival d’Automne à Paris
With support of DICRéAM and Hors Pistes / Centre Pompidou
First performed on 10 December 2018 at Théâtre de la Cité internationale (Paris) with the Festival d’Automne à Paris
Using archive material and documentary inquiry as her starting point, Émilie Rousset’s performative research projects explore the theatrical potential present in the gap between original document and its representation. For the first time at the Festival d’Automne, two shows bear witness to this work, of which humour is an essential component.
In the company of the film-maker Louise Hémon, Émilie Rousset has been creating, since 2015, the “Rituels” series, an evolving collection of films and performances which probe the rites of our society by drawing upon the respective codes of theatre and documentary cinema. Le Grand Débat, their fourth collaboration, recreates a televised debate in preparation for the second round of the presidential elections, comprising a collage of archives from debates taking place between 1974 and 2017. The mechanism of the TV studio set and the codes of the live broadcast are brought to the stage. Sat opposite each other at a table, two actors Emmanuelle Lafon and Laurent Poitrenaux, reenact these fragments before the eyes of the audience and the cameras. This final debate, a mixture of rhetoric and adrenaline, has a filmic language all of its own, in addition to its own editing principles, decor and media-based history. With its extremely codified rules, this event is a true ritual of modern times. But is it a ritual for democracy or for the television? The dividing line is a very fine one indeed.
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Estimated running time: 1h05
See also
Émilie Rousset, Maya Boquet Reconstitution : Le procès de Bobigny
In a highly original manner, Émilie Rousset and Maya Boquet bring to the stage testimonies and archives arising from a crucial event in the advancement of women's rights. Navigating a path between the fifteen performers, each spectator builds his or her own mental journey in relation to the subject and its ramifications in today's world, but also in terms of the very process of representation itself.
Émilie Rousset, Louise Hémon Rituel 5 : La Mort
Now it is the turn of Émilie Rousset and Louise Hémon to work with eight young performers as part of the Talents Adami Théâtre scheme, hosted for the tenth year running at the Atelier de Paris. With their habitual brand of humour, they dissect beliefs and representations linked to death, rituals and funeral-related practices.
In the same place
Steven Cohen Boudoir
If, up until now, the performances of the South African artist have consisted of exposing himself onstage or in public spaces, in his latest piece Steven Cohen plays host to audiences from within the confines of an intimate, private space, the boudoir. The latter, a chapel or refuge, becomes a place in which he gathers up his memories of his past - as well as those of the last century, gruesome though they may be.
Lina Majdalanie, Rabih Mroué Photo-Romance
How do we go about presenting the adaptation of a famous film to the Lebanese authorities in charge of censorship? We come to realize that it is about a film which recounts the improbable encounter between two very dissimilar individuals both of whom are experiencing social alienation in fascist Italy in 1938. The adaptation is set in Beirut in 2007, shortly after an Israeli attack on Lebanon.