Directed by Valery Warnotte of Compagnie L’Intervention Paris, France
Written by Olivier Coyette of Brussels, Belgium
Original Score by Frédéric Lamarre of Paris, France
Personal Statement of Purpose from the Artistic Director of Théâtre du Rêve, Park Krausen:
Coyette’s work is surreptitiously political, heavily peppered with humor and very theatrical. Sometimes poetic, sometimes banal, sometimes acutely blunt, his work, skillfully directed by Warnotte, adeptly allows theater, music, theatrical devices and actors’ abilities to surprise the audience as only live theater can still do. Coyette has his finger on the pulse of world culture - evident in his theatrical dialogues particularly between Europe and the States, between art and artist, between the self and the subconscious or alter-ego.
None of this was more apparent to me personally, than when I first experienced Coyette’s work at the Conservatoire National Superieur d’Art Dramatique in Paris, France. Amandine Pudlo (company member of Mr. Warnotte’s – Compagnie de L’Intervention) directed a piece by Coyette. The students were rapt, jarred, and tickled, they giggled and harrumphed. It was evident that he was a porte-parole not only for francophone youth but more specifically for young artists. As an American I was equally rapt and excited about what theater could still accomplish. It was like nothing I had experienced in the States. This was in 2002. Since then, I have been laying the ground work to bring his work to the “American Stage” and to the American theater-going population.
This brings us to 2006 and our project. Coyette is having an American premier of his work in New York with Novisi Productions this year. The director of the Novisi group is the translator of the original piece that we commissioned Coyette to write for Théâtre du Rêve. Théâtre du Rêve artists wanted to work directly with this playwright and director combination. This past August we completed a one-week brainstorming and workshop with Olivier Coyette and director Valery Warnotte. Special fundraising with our board and key benefactors made this possible. They, along with members of the French Consulate and the Alliance Francaise were invited to join us. Coyette has written for specific companies in the past and not only did we, the actors, share ideas but shared what we most wanted to do and most feared doing on stage. Coyette would write one or both into the script and Warnotte into the direction of the script. What a rare and “live” opportunity in collaboration.
What is this project about?A few words about VOIR UN AMI PLEURER from the playwright – Olivier Coyette:
"America is a huge country. That's what my "American mother" used to say, when I lived in Seattle for a year. It's been a while now, but I've kept that thought in my mind. Do we know this country? I live in Europe now - the French speaking part (!!!), but I still am fascinated by the "American way of life". Everything we find "new" comes from your place, guys, and it is common sense to say that. In Europe we've been "Americanized" since WW 2, and I don't know if it's good or if it's bad. It just is. The thing is: what do we have in common? I'd say: a lot. Europe has history. America has the present time and some of the future to come. We share a lot of our roots. We understand each other. Well, sometimes not. But since September 11, I would say that "we are all American". That's what Jean-Marie Colombani, editor of "Le Monde", wrote the day after that, and I agreed with him. VOIR UN AMI PLEURER (title of a Jacques Brel song) would like to establish the forgotten links that bound us, that make us friends and cousins, across that ocean which also is a sea of dreams."
A few words from Park Krausen – Artistic Director Théâtre du Rêve:
Voir un Ami Pleurer takes place in both the US and in France. It glimpses the dynamics between Europeans and Americans today in light of the past - revealing and throwing into question stereotypes and prejudices that we have of each other. In a hilarious romp, peppered with music and dance - Olivier Coyette creatively reiterates again and again the cliché - "can't live with them, can't live without them" - without using the cliché itself. This is evident in the excerpt attached where Bernadette (French) speaks of Andre’s (her American husband’s) need to make boules a quick fire, spectator sport where one might need a commentator – trying to fit it into the American mould of football or basketball. The result: absurdly comic. Voir un Ami Pleurer is a fascinating comic drama of the deep and ever dynamic relationship between Americans and Europeans – Europe and America.
A few words from Valery Warnotte – Director of Voir un Ami Pleurer
We are developing a project with Olivier Coyette inspired by the famous editorial by Jean-Marie Colombani, director of Le Monde: “We are all Americans” that appeared the day after the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York. The piece consists of confronting our “European vision” of the United States with that of another reality. It’s with the resonance of that headline that we must hear the title of the play, which is also a song by Jaques Brel, “Voir un Ami Pleurer”. We are passive spectators of an America where anything and everything is possible, the best and the worst. An America of dream and fantasy that belong to those who created it, who create it and who are always a target of visceral hatred.
Where else but the Theater can we give speech and words to the defeated of our civilization? I think of the mother of a young soldier killed in Iraq, and when the flags that float from the neighboring homes are not sufficient enough to soak up her pain….