Ambre Kahan was born in Avignon. In 1985. A flagship year in the history of a festival forever changed, that summer, by The Mahabharata by Peter Brook and his nine hours of performance which changed the face of Provençal nights. Long-term shows are now at home here. Presented at the MC93 in Bobigny, will the fresco directed by Ambre Kahan also reach the city of the Popes? On hope. Not only because the adaptation of The Art of Joy, story by the Italian Goliarda Sapienza (1924-1996) – published in 1998 and translated in France in 2005 by Nathalie Castagné for Viviane Hamy editions – defies the limits of duration (five and a half hours, which do not deal, for ‘time, only of the first two parts of the book). But because, with this extraordinary proposition, the artist sets fire to the theaters where the Mercury collective climbs as the story of the heroine Modesta is told, in Sicily at the beginning of the 20th century.e century.
When we meet her in Paris, the Avignonnaise, now based in Burgundy, displays gentleness, calm and serenity. But appearances are deceiving. This displayed self-control is the reverse of an intense inner turmoil. The hand clenched around a cup of tea, the one that defines itself as “super organized” devoted four years of work to the text before deploying episodes 1 and 2 on stage (the full version being under construction).
She traveled to Sicily in the writer’s footsteps, carried out investigations there and delved deeply into her subject. She doesn’t know how to do it any other way. “Before projects, I like to look for things that are far from the theater. » She doesn’t prepare, she “overprepare”. A requirement which also applies to the actors, to whom it asks to arrive “su text” at rehearsals. After which she propels them into a main sewn immersion: “I install them in the stage space and the sound duration. They know they have to jump into the void. I am in control and I never interrupt them. I only intervene once the sequence is finished. »
“Absolute liberation”
Singular method (she prefers to talk about “grammar”) which leaves the actors free to grope, without being castrated in their momentum, before finding their way. This allows them to access the right tone and gesture, and explains why their ensemble, of rare coherence, vibrates in tune.
Ambre Kahan does not invent a gaming school, but she injects a key element into her system: respect. “I don’t want to intrude into the actors’ private lives. What happens between them on the set must arise outside of my presence. » To see the beauty of the scenes (especially erotic) which weave The Art of Joy, we say to ourselves that this withdrawal is good. And that trust in interpreters “responsible” has as a corollary their development. How did the director make this obvious statement her own?
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