THE MORNING LIST
Before the launch of the end-of-year shows, the month of December is rich in offers in all areas of the performing arts. A minimalist Shakespeare in Lyon, a satin shoe almost finished in Paris, a Polyphemus dazzling in Versailles, an irresistible Alison Wheeler on tour, a bustle of children’s events in Le Havre… A great way to occupy the long evenings while waiting for Christmas.
THEATER
“Haribo Kimchi”, Jaha Koo’s theatrical cuisine
The South Korean artist Jaha Koo had already stood out in 2019 by starring in his show Cuckoo to rice cookersthese domestic robots present in all kitchens in Southeast Asia. With his new creation, he transforms the theater into pojang machaThese street food stalls, typical of the streets of South Korea, attract night owls of all kinds. The rice cooker will once again occupy a prominent place in this culinary journey, where food serves as a vector for reflection on cultural assimilation, symbolized by the clash between Haribo sweets and kimchia traditional method of fermenting vegetables. These links between food and identity are also an opportunity for Jaha Koo to continue his research into hybrid forms that combine cooking, documentary writing, video, music and robotics. F.Da.
Théâtre de la Bastille, Paris (Autumn Festival), December 9-14.
Nicole García in “Royan”, by Marie NDiaye
Summit meeting: that of the writer Marie NDiaye and the actress Nicole García, in royanpremiered at the Avignon Festival in 2021 and performed at the La Commune theater in Aubervilliers. The supple, feline waves of Marie Ndiaye’s writings capture the buried echoes of the life of a woman, a French teacher who believed she was protecting herself from “acrid effluvia of misfortune”but whose tragedy comes to light during the suicide of one of his students. Nicole García plays her magnificently, with the toughness of a wounded beast, this woman in a desperate situation: her tough and wild performance, with its brittle edges, has no equivalent. F.Da.
La Commune Theater, Aubervilliers, from December 11 to 15.
“Le Songe” simplified by Gwenaël Morin
For more than twenty years, Gwenaël Morin has stripped theatrical art of its trinkets to give it back an urgency, an intensity, a Dionysian dimension. He proves it once again with this. Dream Free adaptation of Shakespeare’s work that brightened the nights of Avignon during the 2023 By Cleaning Festival. A Midsummer Night’s Dream of the charm it gives him, playing with almost nothing and betting everything on the play of four excellent actors – Virginie Colemyn, Julian Eggerickx, Barbara Jung and Grégoire Monsaingeon – the director rediscovers all the acuity of this comedy about the madness of romantic desire. As the great Will says, “love does not see with the eyes, but with the imagination”. F.Da.
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